Metamorphosis?

Nell and Sherry came back today bringing with them  take-out fried catfish dinners from our favorite Friday lunch spot.  Fisher's Restaurant in Bedford, a small family  owned and run breakfast and lunch spot next to the railroad tracks, makes the best catfish ever.  When my son used to come often (before Covid restrictions), he always had to have breakfast there.  Sean says he has had grits in almost every place in the South   and none come close to the perfection of those at Fisher's.  Nell, Sherry and I made it a habit to go there on Fridays.  Fisher's has survived Covid when so many small restaurants have not, so that says something.  What a treat to sit down at my own table today with two good friends and once again enjoy that special meal.

When we three got together it was always tale and laugh time.  Some of the same today.  Not sure how this came up, but I recalled the time I moved from my farm to a small house on a hillside in Hebron, NY.  Two barn cats came with me, along with my Siamese, Carrie.  This house had a walk-out basement and since Carrie would not allow the barn cats, Kit-Kat and Burnzy, upstairs in the house, I installed a cat door in the cellar door and set up bed boxes, food and water for those two.  They could come and go as they pleased.  The house was set into the hillside.  A path from the back yard led to a cornfield atop the hill.  In the Fall, wild turkeys populated that cornfield and deer and once even a moose (but that is a story for another time.) Harder to be aware of were the many chipmunks.  Little ground squirrels with their big fluffy striped tails darting in and out among the dry stalks and stones.  Kit-Kat and Burnzy soon discovered them.  All their sunny autumn days were spent stalking and pursuing these fascinating creatures.  As winter approached I began to notice the absence of chipmunks.  Weird too, that now my backyard seemed to have acquired a colony of Hamsters, tailless tiny rodents often kept as pets.  And another strange thing.  Where did those cats get the little pieces of striped fur they were so often seen tossing around? 

I can't truthfully say no chipmunks were harmed; however, they apparently do survive without tails.