The night was a strange one. Gracie woke me up twice whining and crying. I just thought she wanted on the bed so I moved for her to jump up and then fell back to sleep. When she stood beside my bed the third time and was whining and crying again, it broke through the nighttime fog of my mind. What in the heck was she doing standing on the floor and why whining. I guessed she needed to go out so I went downstairs and let her out. The poor dog almost fell down the outside deck stairs as they were iced over. She disappeared for a while, and because of the ice and slipping, I went looking. She was on the deck eating plants. Gracie didn’t feel good. That’s what it was all about. I fed her some spider fronds but she was still restless. It was five o’clock, an ungodly time of the day unless it’s Christmas or they’re calling your flight. I fed her some more fronds. I turned on the news to keep me occupied while I watched her. By about nine she seemed fine, even ate the treats I had left for her. I didn’t hear her go upstairs, she can be sneaky, but I heard her coming downstairs. I knew she had eaten the cat food. All was well with Gracie. At 9:30, we both went back to bed and we both slept until noon.

I am going to get a weapon, an anti-spawn weapon. When I looked out the window just a bit ago, I saw two red spawns, one at each feeder. At first I just thought it was a trick of the eyes, the sort of reaction Scrooge had when he saw Marley in the door knocker. It wasn’t. I opened the window and screamed like a crazy woman. I must have looked and sounded like an extra from Network, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore.” The spawns didn’t care. Their pelts will be mine, metaphorically of course.

To think, I used to love to go to Boston Common and feed the grey spawns, but I was a kid then and what did I know. I thought the spawns were cute, and when they came close and took the peanuts, I was thrilled.

I suppose I can thank the spawns for adding a bit of excitement to my day. That last line is a bit scary but it gives you an idea of how boring my life has been of late.