A squirrel can drive you nuts

                               I suppose that if Husband and I were more evolved, our biggest worry this week would be the national debt ceiling.
                               It isn't.
                               My worry is Husband's mental health.  His is a pair of squirrels who've spent the last week decimating what was to be a bountiful harvest of Jonathan apples from two dwarf trees in the backyard.
                              Husband planted them at least five years ago, and before this summer, the trees failed to produce much of anything.  Maybe it was the soil, we speculated.  Maybe not enough sun.  The trees looked healthy enough, but they were all leaf, no fruit. 
                             Which is why last fall, I laid down the law.  If those trees didn't bring forth at least one pie full of apples in 2011 they were coming down and going to the mulch pile.
                             "No apples, no more prime space in the yard," I said.  Husband agreed.  Fair's fair.  We'd grow something else.
                             It was as though God or the trees were listening.
                             This year, there are an astounding number of apples on both trees.
                             Or rather there WERE an astounding number.
                             Turns out squirrels have a thing for apples.  Two, in particular, have been taking turns stealing the unripened little green orbs right off the branches.  They boldly sit beneath the tree in plain sight to eat them.
                             "Deeeeelicious," one said.
                             "Double deeelicious," answered the other, tossing a core.
                             I've watched them just yank fruit from lower, inside branches of the tree.  To get hold of the apples dangling from higher branches and branches too thin to actually hold them, the thieving rodents shake the tree.
                            They just climb into it, make a lot of commotion -------- sometimes it looks like the tree is vibrating ------- and the apples fall like they would after hurricane winds.
                            Husband is beside himself.  A normally quiet, temperate man, happy to share whatever is his, he's taken to jumping up from the breakfast table and running out into the yard to scare away the animals as they approach his trees.
                            Dog, who should be the one in the family protecting the yard from varmints, has abdicated the responsibility to Husband.  I think because it's such a hoot to watch the man in action.
                            "Some!  You can have some apples.  Not every single damned apple," he scolded.
                            The squirrels didn't look sorry.
                            Yesterday morning , Husband, tying his tie, looked out the big kitchen window to find the squirrels knocking their walnut-sized brains out to loosen another load of unripened apples.  He ran out of the sliding glass door, grabbed the garden hose and charged the vibrating tree.
                            His finger on the nozzle trigger he aimed the water cannon at the squirrels.
                            The rodents, who I assumed were snickering as I was, held their position in the tree.  What's a little water pressure when there's this much fun to be had?
                            "Get a load of this guy," one called to the other.
                            "He's hilarious," answered his friend.
                            "They're drunk on apples," lamented Husband as he returned to the kitchen and plopped onto a chair to finish breakfast.  "They're like marauding pirates drunk on rum.  Ruthless.  Remorseless."
                            He stared forlornly at the squirrels still at work in his tree, mumbling about lead pellets.  Then he wondered out loud what's so great about organic gardening.  He didn't use any chemicals to keep pests away from the tree.  Just pruned carefully and kept the areas below the trees clean of debris so they'd stay healthy.
                             He was saying that if Ortho has a chemical to rid the planet of squirrels, he'd order a barrel of it for our backyard.  And he'd double the concentration to be sure they were deader than dead.
                             This as he buttered his toast.
                             I reminded him that we love animals and respect the planet.  He wasn't listening.
                             He says he's going to build a tree stand.  He'll lay in wait, maybe dressed in camouflage and wielding a billy club.  Those pirates won't know what happened to them.
                             I'm starting to feel sorry for the squirrels.