The following blog has nothing to say about weight loss, green smoothies, or Eddie Izzard. It does talk about squirrels, nut sacks (and not the kind you get from Planter’s), and going to the dentist. Oh. And Law & Order reruns. And spiders. It is all a friend’s fault because he had to go and write about velcro and ball rubbing and after four seconds of reading about that “I fell into a dream” as the Beatles would say and this story popped out. That is all.
I’m in the process of having a crown replaced: I had the prep done week before last and Wednesday, the tooth was a little achy and I could feel some throbbing in my maxillary sinus. Any hint of dental infection is something you want to have checked out, of course—so I made arrangements to see my dentist that afternoon.
I love my dentist’s office. Each bay has floor to ceiling windows looking out over the manufactured landscape. To further distract patients from their dental procedure, they’ve hung bird feeders up around the building. Going to the dentist becomes a Lidocaine-fueled festival of feathered voyeurism, which I quite enjoy.
So my visit started with the dental technician taking a look-see at my tooth. As we were chatting, a squirrel propelled itself off the fence and landed upright on the bird feeder, where it proceeded to grab and eat handfuls of seeds.
You should know that I’m a city girl. My idea of roughing it is to go somewhere without reservations. “Camping” means that there isn’t a fully stocked minibar in the room and if they don’t furnish me with a Turkish terry bathrobe, I’m checking out. Really.
Suffice it to say, I’ve never been a big fan of the Discovery Channel. Animals on the DC are doing one of two things: having sex, or eating each other not in the context of having sex. And sometimes they have sex and then they eat each other (see life cycles of spiders or praying mantis’, which are technically insects and not animals at all), which just seems amazingly rude and not nearly as much fun to watch as a Law & Order marathon.
Back to Scene
The dental technician and I both notice said squirrel standing upright on the bird feeder at the same time. And then she says, “Oh my God, is that ...?” and as I’m looking at this squirrel I notice two things:
- It’s definitely a boy squirrel. I’m literally three feet away—separated by plate glass thank God—from his testicles, which upon doing a quick translation into human anatomical proportions, I’m shocked to discover would be practically down to his knees.
- Apparently this squirrel really likes bird seed or is thinking about some upcoming hot tree-house tryst with a lady squirrel because he’s sporting about two inches of squirrel junk. Oh my.
There’s a moment of silence and then the dental tech and I both burst out laughing to the point that my dentist (in the other room) yells over to find out what is so funny. That makes us laugh even harder because neither of us is going to tell Dr. T. that the entertainment of the afternoon is Balzac the Mutant Squirrel.
The squirrel, who could see us and hear us through the window was nonplussed. He had his snack, showed off, and then decided to take a nap on the fence—which is where I snapped this G-rated picture.
And my tooth was fine.
P.S. If you don’t believe me, Google “male squirrel anatomy” and select “images.” Haunting. Not that I have given much prior thought to squirrel anatomy, but if I had, my vision would be something along the lines of Ken and Barbie. I mean after all, baby animals come out the way that Pixar draws them, right? Reality is shockingly harsh.
