Animal farm

After lunch I was outside taking laundry off the clothesline and hanging some wet stuff out. Our dryer is dead. The culprit: a mouse, apparently, who committed suicide by fiddling around with the circuit board inside the dryer. I assume one of the cats brought the mouse in and suggested he make a nice warm nest in there.

The late mouse may be related to the locally-famous Baraboo suicidal squirrels. With some regularity, our neighboring town and Sauk County seat, Baraboo, suffers a power outage caused by depressed squirrels chewing on transformers.

At any rate, the dryer people are getting the replacement part -- which will take some time -- and we are drying the old-fashioned way for now. Fortunately the washer, which seemed to develop a leak at the same time the dryer died, has mysteriously healed itself. So we are able to wash things.

Peter just got back from a wilderness camping trip, and I think it is a good thing the washer is working. He left a bunch of smelly stuff outside rather than bringing it into the house.

Anyway, back to the beginning. I was working at the clothesline when I looked over and a small brown bear had come down the drive and was bounding around Tom. Well, not a brown bear, exactly. It was a neighbor's six-month-old chocolate lab. Boundless energy, weighs in the range of 500 pounds. Doesn't have a collar, and from time to time delights in exploring the neighborhood. It is not clear to me that the dog lives here. It may just be visiting the owner's mother, who does live down the road from us. Friendly dog, but quite capable of knocking a full-grown adult to the ground.

The cats huddled in the house, eyes large and staring out the windows or laundry door. Puppy went away, I gave the cats a snack and all settled down. I just hope the dog doesn't go up to Jerry's. The barn kittens would not make even a mouthful for him.