I'm drinking a martini and trying to save some baby squirrels

Yeah, that's the title of my blog post, and I'm sticking to it.

The martini is one part orangecello liquor, three parts vodka, and one part cranberry juice. With lots of crushed ice.

The squirrels are really little, eyes still closed and with barely any hair.

That's what I'm focusing on right now, besides my kids who are busy writing stories with their grown-up bunny pens purchased for them by one of their great aunts. One story is about a cat and a duck who didn't get along, were put in jail ("for 590 days," Hannah said) and finally learned to get along when they discovered a mutual love of playing baseball. Lillian's story read, simply, "Daddy, you're bald." It is apparently futuristic.

I almost just fell down the back stairs, which shows you how well I hold my liquor. And also, I just checked on the squirrels about 30 minutes ago. They're warm and wriggly.

I really resent this. But mostly I don't. Alright, a little. I don't want to worry about little babies who still desperately need their mama.

Seriously, why did we have to rake that patch of pachysandra, only to rake up a bunch of fur and two wriggling babies and one of their (we presume) brothers or sisters, mostly devoured by something or other?

Because I'm not a huge squirrel fan. But two little bodies that keep nestling up to one another in their makeshift nest have a tendency to make one a squirrel fan.

Or, at least, I'm rooting for them.

And I'm thinking if I still made milk, I'd be pumping a little to try to syringe into their little rodent mouths. Although with the alcohol, I'd have to pump and dump and wait two hours.

Having been given a name and email by a neighbor, who actually knows someone who rehabilitates squirrels (what luck!), I'm hoping they survive long enough away from their mother to make it to a much better caretaker. I've been told they need warmth (heating pad) and water, along with as much of their natural nest as we can bring inside. So I had a heating pad covered with a pillowcase (totally disposable, now), which is also covered with winter-rotted leaves and a ton of squirrel hair. It's a bit frightening, that big nest of hair sitting on something I frequently use to help relieve the pain of a migraine.

(This is the crapload of hair they're buried under.)

It's not right, but decency dictates I try to save these little fuckers. And I'm glad I was home and intervened, since Dave suggested they wouldn't make the night and perhaps we should hasten their demise in some fashion: squirrel baby euthanasia in a bucket of water.

But I won't have it, the murdering of these siblings. They won't die tonight, and they certainly won't meet their end in a nasty bed of ground cover with ants and cats and the fox I see almost every time I look out the bathroom window in the dark of night trying to make dessert of them.

(Don't scream. Seriously. If you're drunk, this is kind of cute.)

So the woman our neighbor knows, I just talked to her, despite being slightly inebriated. I giggled a bit too much, thinking about the luck of this. Who rehabs squirrels? Well, apparently a co-worker of my neighbor.

David is driving them now, he and two little squirrel babies in the Subaru, to their new mama. I find this really endearing, that he's willing to drive 45 minutes to find them another home, even though they probably won't make it.

Chances are, he's getting laid tonight, that hunky squirrel transporter.

I'm gonna go fix myself another drink and listen to the kids' next story: "Dad Interrupts People and Spills Coffee." (<-----not making that one up, that's the title).

The end.