Gray Animals the Size of a Breadbox

We share the acreage with two gray animals the size of a breadbox. One is a cat who prowls and yowls. If the pet flap is open, it may sample Jasmine's food, scarpering off if someone comes into the kitchen. It certainly wants to assert something because it has sprayed the back door.

When Jasmine and the gray cat encounter each other, they ignore each other conspicuously. If Jasmine is not around, the gray cat may cry under the windows. Jim likes to interpret this as "Can Jasmine come out and play?" I'm not so sure, but I don't have an alternative interpretation.

The other gray animal is a woodchuck who has a den under the spring house. I call him Rumpelstiltskin because of his ... rump. Yesterday must have been Woodchuck Take-Back-the-Daylight Day, because I saw him twice: once sitting on the back deck (but slipping cat-like away when I stuck my head out) and a second time on the concrete apron of the driveway, just surveying the scene. Each time I mistook him briefly for the gray cat.

Glen was mowing the front field at the time, and the woodchuck may have been wondering why all the racket right at meal time. When you're a woodchuck, I suppose it's always mealtime. With Glen mowing our fields, and Paul Mallow finishing his, it was a noisy morning.