A Massacre in Medford

This past Saturday morning I opened the back door to bring 96 to his guitar lesson, but instead screamed and slammed the door shut before any of the ten thousand flies which had alit on poor Papa Chipmunk's corpse could make it through the kitchen door. I called for 96 (98 conveniently at bowling for the morning) to take care of The Situation. I hadn't questioned why 96 had only minutes earlier gone out the back door with a bag of trash, only to return to the house through the front door.

He had of course seen the poor thing, stepped over it, and left it for me.  What a charmer, eh?

So I holler and 96 comes running (more accurately described as: he yells down from upstairs, "Wotsa-maddama?" then comes sauntering) and cleans up the corpse. While he's disposing of the body in our usual manner (hint: it involves our shovel and our creek), I'm still grossed out and leave by way of the front door, and come around to the car in the back. 96 was still by the back door, replacing the shovel we leave there in the winter to shovel snow, and apparently the rest of the year for mortuary purposes.  I see the thing is still there, and gesture towards it, about to accuse 96 of simply moving the it so I couldn't see it from the back door.  (In my defense, that could totally have happened.) Literally, it was three feet away, but just out of the line of sight from the back door. He looked down at the same time, and performed a Dick-Van-Dyke-worthy pirouette, artfully proclaiming his surprise. So he takes the shovel again and again tosses one into the creek. And we're off to guitar lessons, free of any and all things morbid and bloody in, near, or around my abode.

So why am I here again, this fine autumn Monday morning, this time alone in the house, being held hostage by the one dead thing outside the front door and another dead thing outside the back door? I thought the whole point of having teenagers was to not have to deal with dead things anymore.

Note to self: cats stay inside for a while, so that Mr. and Mrs. Chipmunks have a flipping chance to gather their winter stores in peace. They have little baby chipmunk mouths to feed!