TKOG Who is crawling with vermin

NTKOG #92: The kind of animal-loving hippie who is so at one with the local fauna that she lets them writhe all over her body.

I am: grossed out — understandably, I think — by roaches, rats and vermin of any other description. Including squirrels.

I am not: actually that big on animals, period. If it can’t talk or reason, you can keep it.

The Scene: A snowy stroll through the Boston Common, accompanied by Justice and Kiss-Ducker during their post-New Year’s visit. The paths were frothing with snow, so our stroll was on the brisk slash perfunctory side, when Kiss-Ducker stopped and gazed at a tree.

“The squirrels!” she said. “There are so many of them. And they’re so — fat.”

Not one of the actual Common squirrels, but I swear to all that's holy that they were this size. Like a meaner Jabba the Hutt.

Factual, guys. The Common seems to be home to a rare bred of enormo-squirrels. On top of this, their fur was uncommonly glossy and they were docile little bastards. We  puzzled over their enormity for a while (genetics? natural selection?) until Kiss-Ducker knelt down to make smoochy noises and one of the little dudes leaped right into her hands.

Dude. Squirrels. College town. Park right across the street from a 7eleven. Why hadn’t we put it together before? Dudes were feeding the little guys! Obviously we had to get into that action.

Bought some hot roasted almonds and, after skimming a layer off the top, set out to feed the vermin. At first, I was too timid to let one of the knobby-toothed little dudes approach my hands, so I tried to toss them to the squirrels’ gaping mouths. But I missed a few shots and the still-hot glaze managed to seal the nuts onto the squirrels’ pelts. Clearly that was going to get gory after we were gone.

Kiss-Ducker had great luck holding out a nut and letting the squirrel eat from her fingers, so I tried it, and dang if the little guys showed absolutely no fear in the face of being hand-fed by benevolent giants. The only trouble was that they were too into it. Five minutes in, squirrels were scampering over from other trees, staging rear attacks on the three of us, getting tangled up in our boots, all to get their hot nut fix.

After twenty minutes or so, we were about ready to toss the remaining nuts and call it a day, when a college-aged guy walked by. “You feeding the squirrels?” he asked pleasantly. After we copped the truth, he smiled back: “Makin’ ‘em do tricks? The really fat ones are the best — they’ll do anything for a nut.”

Dude, squirrels with sufficiently disordered eating to degrade themselves to the point of doing tricks? Friggin’ love it! We begged the guy for a demonstration, so he taunted a squirrel with nuts until it climbed up to his neck, all the while recounting tales of wearing two, three, four squirrels atop his hat only days prior.

I was so terrified of the little beasts that I had to try it. After about fifteen false starts and lots of disinterest from the sated squirrels, I managed to coax one to run up my leg, all the way to the top of my thigh, and submit to ginger petting. I believe he would have made it right the way atop my fedora, but, dude, my hat and I have a good relationship and I just don’t know that it would survive the injustice of squirrel shit.

Photo, courtesy of Kiss-Ducker, of a squirrel about to begin the incredible journey up my leg. Note also the little fiend scampering in to try to steal the nut.

The Verdict: Soooo, I get my communing with nature badge, right? At the time I thought this was an extremely amusing one-time diversion, but when The Ex came to town a week later, I immediately took him to the Boston Common to attempt squirrel feeding. Unfortunately there weren’t any about, or else my fedora would have had to fear for its life. So even though this didn’t budge my profound ambivalence toward animals, I did feel rather chummy toward the little mongrels, so I venture this one a weak thumbs-up.

Tagged as: boston, boston common, didn't know getting a guy to crawl in your lap was quite this easy, don't get on me about how these squirrels can't survive in the wild b/c i fed them -- they're too fat to run from predators anyway, hot nuts, the way to a squirrel's stomach