Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Kaboom! An unintended consequence of leash laws.

Today was very special. There was a nice cool breeze blowing the shade away from the inside of my bedroom window which is right on the front porch of our single story condominium. The architect was probably either a voyeur as a paper delivery person, or loved to wake up long before the roosters at dawn to the sound of a newspaper smacking against the glass.

My window was open all night and I slept through the paper delivery. It was supposed to be a good day. Once again, our architect in his infinite wisdom designed the baths toward the inside of the building with no possibility of adding any windows. When the lights went out I was in the middle of my shower. Total darkness. The outage was preceded immediately by a loud explosion.

Squirrels were chasing each other around transformers and power lines. Inevitably a squirrel closed a circuit where the wires come together at a transformer, and the immense heat generated by the high voltage created an artificial thunder clap. In my 42 years I have yet to see the resulting spark and flying tufts of fur trailing smoke, but occasionally on our walk, the dog will appear to be obsessed about the base of a particular power pole.

Lately the incidents of squirrel and utility encounters have increased dramatically. Perhaps as a delayed unintentional consequence of pet leash laws. The squirrel population is growing out of control because they have no predators.

I miss the good old days when dogs and cats came home on their own at the end of the day and weren’t so hungry, and squirrels were rarely seen.

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