537: Squirrels... again

I think I might be obsessed with squirrels. In the last week I have written two blog posts featuring prominent participation from squirrels (three if you include this one), and having just sat down to write a short story I seem to have written a few hundred words from the perspective of a squirrel. Of course squirrels cannot write, nor understand any form of human language (except maybe the amazing trained ones from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; yes, they are real squirrels...except the CGI ones... I obviously wasn't talking about those...), so the majority of the squirrel soliloquy is an explanation of the unlikelihood of a squirrel being able to write a story, and the request that the reader suspends their disbelief and imagines it in squirrel language. Squeaks, or whatever. It's rubbish really, but even when all you write is rubbish it's necessary to push through, to keep going. So stubbornly I will pursue the confused, apologetic squirrel soliloquy debating with itself whether it is actually speaking human or squirrel. I will pursue it and emerge the other side with either a pretty good piece of flash fiction, or as just a slightly more experienced writer with another shit short story.

Anyway the squirrels around here are rarely seen with laptop open, or even a pen and notepad, and even if they were I question their ability to use or understand the function of these advanced writing tools. If I grabbed hold of one of the bushy-tailed rodents, presented it with the gift of a stylus and wax tablet, I suspect that even that primitive and ancient technology would be far to complicated for the little squishy squirrel brain. Rather than jotting down a few words, writing E=MC², or doodling a fish with two heads, I expect little Mr or Missus Nutkin would refuse to accept the equipment into their little squirrel hands, and instead simply run away in terror at the giant alien mammal forcing mysterious objects upon it. The most advanced piece of equipment I've seen one of the local squirrels with was a paper plate, and even then it wasn't using it for anything, merely standing near it in the park. The paper plate was wedged into the iron railings of the boundary fence, and the squirrel was doing some squirrelling in the soil at the base of a great oak. I was minding my own business.

Can't promise I won't be blogging about squirrels again, but on the flip side, I can't imagine why I would. Not much left to say, and they are not among my short list of specialist subjects (kept in my wallet at all times should I ever need to go on Mastermind in an emergency).