Graveyard Dirt: Two Worlds and In-between

Ms. Graveyard Dirt Baiting

Not yesterday morning, but the morning before, I found myself trudging overripe pumpkins outside to the Shango Tree/Phallic Worship altar just before bed (<- WE'RE CURRENTLY SLEEPING DAYS AND WORKING NIGHTS) and in doing so I stumbled over this scene of carnage and desecration:

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"SOMETHING'S DUG UP THE FUCKING SHANGO ALTAR OUTSIDE AND I'M PRETTY SURE IT WASN'T ONE OF THE FUCKING CATS," I announced in caps lock. Italics, knowing it's always best to drop whatever he's doing when I begin speaking in caps, joined me in the backroom as we stared in the direction of the disturbed altar.

These weren't makeshift toilet holes that the neighborhood cats make in my line of beets (STOP SHITTING ON AND DIGGING UP MY FUCKING BEETS, CATS), they were deep gouges that reached into the very bottom of the raised dirt bed. My (VERY HEAVY, VERY DENSE, VERY SOLID, VERY ERECT) stone cock was knocked asunder, and its two black balls unceremoniously kicked off the surface of the altar.

Something BIG plundered my recently cleaned altar space, going directly to where my eight rabbit heads where buried within. Weirdly enough, it DIDN'T take the huge ass soup bone I left as an offering on the bricks (in fact, it hadn't even MOVED despite the severe disturbance surrounding it) and it DIDN'T bother fucking with the eight rabbit carcasses decomposing beneath a black plastic bucket just a yard or two away.

Whatever IT was it WASN'T a cat, dog or hedgehog - so what the fuck was IT? What the fuck would be large enough to RIP THROUGH BUCKETS OF DIRT and play soccer with dubiously shaped rocks? What the fuck would just IGNORE DECAYING RABBIT CARCASSES and A MOTHER OF A SOUP BONE SITTING OUTSIDE LIKE A COOLING PIE ON A WINDOW LEDGE?

"FOX," Italics hypothesized. In a deliberate attempt to not feel disappointed I didn't believe him. (<- LONG STORY SHORT? A PAIR OF FOXES CAME TO US LAST YEAR IN OCTOBER, BUT THE NEIGHBORS DIDN'T SHARE OUR JOY. AFTER ONE TOO MANY "SOMEONE NEEDS TO KILL THOSE VERMIN" COMMENTS WE HAD TO ASK THE FOXES TO LEAVE. IT BROKE MY HEART SENDING AWAY SOMETHING THAT CAME TO US (THEY CAME FOR OUR OUTSIDE OFFERINGS, AND THEN STAYED WHEN THEY REALIZED THEY WERE WELCOME HERE), AND I'VE SPENT EVERY DAY SINCE LOOKING OUT WINDOWS HOPING THAT, ONE DAY, I'D SEE THE FAMILIAR RUSTY STREAKS OF ORANGE AND BLACK JOGGING ACROSS THE YARD.)

The thing is, there was a sort've kind've maybe chance that it was a fox - just a wee chance, though, and not enough evidence to have me busting out smoked polish sausage. (I DO NOT DEFROST MY BELOVED KIELBASA FOR ANY OLD REASON.) Several nights back, just after midnight, I glanced up from doing the dishes and saw some sort of animal bolting across the street towards the house.

"OHMYGODBADGER!" I gasped, gloriously high and reeling in shock. My brain somersaulted as I tried to piece together what I had just seen. The sighting was a blur - it was dark and raining heavily, I was high and absentmindedly doing the dishes. All I could really remember was a bushy tail, squat body and narrow - but long - face.

"I SAW A BADGER!" I excitedly whispered to Italics, who came racing when he heard my first exclamation of shock and disbelief. "OR, WAIT, MAYBE IT WASN'T A BADGER," doubt had already sunk in. "IT HAD A LONG CONE-LIKE BADGER FACE, BUT I THINK IT HAD A BUSHY TAIL. BUT I DON'T THINK THAT BADGERS HAVE BUSHY TAILS..."

I knew what it WASN'T - a cat. Regardless of how stoned my ass is I know, even on a subconscious level, I'm never going to mistake a cat for something else. ("BADGER!" LITERALLY CAME OUT OF NO WHERE. BEFORE I EVEN PROCESSED THE IMAGE THE WORD TUMBLED OUT.) The body and face just wasn't cat-like despite the tail that I thought I saw. So maybe it was a fox, but wouldn't a fox take a soup bone? The pair of foxes before made off with whatever they could get their little paws on, including old remains of chicken carcasses.

(No, no, not a fox. Don't even consider it because you'll just be disappointed and heartsick.)

Last night was a nocturnal wildlife stakeout. To entice a nighttime visitor an offering of leftovers (venison sausages and homemade yorkshire pudding) were placed at the foot of the sycamore tree (the large tree just outside the office/computer room window). And then? And then we waited, and I spent several hours gingerly peeking over the ledge of the window at any sound of rustling or movement outside.

It happened after midnight. Bitching about the internet's slow ass uploading speed I casually glanced towards the sycamore out of habit only to return my full attention to complaining about our broadband's dial-up speed a few seconds later. That's when it hit me, and I did a classic Scooby Doo double take. Something with white-ish, silvery, gray hair was outside (NOT. A. CAT.), partially obscured by a bag of leaves Mr. Awesome never bothered to dispose of.

"OHMYGODISTHATSOMETHING?" I asked Italics. We squinted, side by side, our faces pressed up against the cold glass. A shape - a robust, squat backside - was jutting out from behind the white bag of fallen leaves. With the room's light off you could see it more clearly amongst the fall foliage, but the identifying majority was, frustrating enough, still hidden behind the sack.

"I'LL GO OUTSIDE," Italics offered, speaking in caps lock because staking out nocturnal Scottish wildlife in your office is V. SRS BUSINESS. I stood in the darkness of the computer room, glasses on and eyes squinting, willing the animal to stay involved in whatever it was doing (EATING) to give Italics enough time to catch a glimpse of our mysterious visitor.

He said it was nasty dirty. As in, dirtballs and leaves stuck to its ass, its wet fur was peppered with organic debris. Its snout was discolored from mud, and its feet caked with damp earth. "HOLY SHIT, OH MY FUCKING GOD," I exclaimed when the startled animal barreled itself towards the side of the house, giving me an excellent view of a miniature black and white striped grizzly bear launching itself into a furious speed that would leave any (mere mortal) human weak in the knees.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have crows, rooks, magpies, and blackbirds, we have European robins (Hezbollah's friend), sparrows, martins, finches, starlings and tits. We have deer running in front of the house around midsummer, and once in autumn we had a pair of foxes eating Burger King and kielbasa out of Chippy's patio offering dishes. We have itsy tiny little Scottish mice, and crazily laid back hedgehogs who don't grudge me too much when I bring them indoors to pull out ticks and fly egg sacs while checking for any obvious wounds.

And now? And now we have a new member to our subdivision wildlife menagerie: Eurasian Badger.

Earthworms, apparently, make up at least 50% of a badger's diet, which explains the altar desecration (ripe with worms due to deliberately adding worm casts to the raised bed to help with the decomposition of the decapitated rabbit heads) and ALSO explains why it didn't actually TAKE any of the half-decayed heads (several were left just lying on the grass without so much as a mark), disturb the plastic bucket of rotting carcasses or bother nudging the hollowed out soup bone.

I straightened up what I could, using Shango's half coconut shell to "ladle" the partially rotted heads back into their altar grave, covering them with what little earth was leftover from the badger's foraging. The pumpkins - with still some structure - were placed onto the surface of the newly patted down space, positioned to at least partially cover a mound of two or three heads.

(A wasted, futile effort since the Shango Tree/Phallic Worship altar is a delectable buffet of worms, insects and maggots for visiting wildlife, but I was SO not up to burying rabbit heads in buckets of dirt at seven in the fucking morning when I was originally getting ready for bed when taking the collapsing pumpkins outside.)

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JESUS EFFING CHRIST, WHY CAN'T I HAVE A DIVINE MALE ALTAR SPACE WITHOUT IT GETTING FUCKED UP, TRASHED OR RUINED? (I JUST FUCKING CLEANED THE SPACE UP, GODDAMMIT! {LOOK HOW FUCKING CLEAN IT WAS!} HOW LONG DID IT TAKE BEFORE IT WAS DECIMATED? TWO WEEKS? THREE?) IT'S LIKE GARBAGE, CHAOS AND AN AVALANCHE OF MESS IS ATTRACTED TO ANYTHING WITH A FUCKING DICK (EVEN IF IT'S A COSMIC ONE).