Vignette City 26.

*** ‘Vignette City’ is an ongoing project of daily writing and urban photography ***

The replacement Chinese squirrels - ours had all disappeared - were more springs and servos than they were squirrels.

But they had tufts of fur hot glued to their fragile plastic exoskeletons and little soft rubber face molds with motion-sensing diode red eyes that were as soulless as the actual squirrels’ eyes had been. 

These little faces were what the Chinese factory workers must have thought our squirrels looked like. They weren’t too wrong, but not too right, really.

Do they have squirrels in China? I literally have no idea.

I watch the little robot squirrels try to climb trees in the park and I wonder, did they lose their squirrels too? Because these are poor replacements. They look about right though.

No one ever asks where the Chinese manufacturers find so much fur. No one wants to know.




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Salty Friendship Token.

So the other day I was minding my own business, sitting in a nice patch of grass and doing some reading and snacking when I heard a small noise nearby. Whatever could it be?

Oh, hey there little squirrel, want to be friends? Here is a salty token of my friendship. You know you want it …

Come on. It’s okay, little squirrels can eat super-processed corn chips made of a whole bunch of ingredients I can’t pronounce …

FRIENDSHIP ACHIEVED!

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Stuff I Should Come Clean About.

Things I totally want to write about but which I probably won’t ever get around to writing about:

- Why I like running out of things.

- Why I wish I could get into these vampire shows.

- How I am totally envious/angry about acquaintances who are active travelers in the world.  

- How squirrels are way better than TV.

- How I pick my toothpaste.

- What I think I have been missing at the Olympics by not having cable.

- Why I think I could (eventually) be good at the biathlon.

- Did you ever think about how weird it is that the mouse and the keyboard function very differently?

- That time that it was more fun to hang out and talk with that stripper than it was to ask her to be all striper-y?

- How I would like to start living the way a grown-up would live.

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How the Food Chain Actually Works.

How the Food Chain Actually Works

by james bezerra

Someone leaves seeds in front of my apartment building for the birds and squirrels. I like to stand too close to the seeds to scare off the big birds, because then the little birds swoop down. The big birds are afraid of me, but the little birds are only afraid of the bigger ones. The squirrels aren’t afraid of me, but hang back anyway because they enjoy being indignant.

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