Squirrel Wars and other Feeding Frenzies

Our friend Rita passed along an amusing and educational DVD called Squirrel Wars, suggesting that it might help solve our Easter bulby mystery. Well, yeah. It also offers a myriad of helpful hints on how to stop bird-feeder and other household predation. Stella Luna found it particularly gripping.

We've also been watching Planet Earth, another one of those grand, sweeping David Attenborough-esque series on the glories of the world we, as a species, are in the process of destroying. Jer and I are suckers for stuff like that -- nature porn; yum. So is Stella Luna, apparently. She's right there the minute we queue up an episode. It takes very little to get, and hold, her attention. She was particularly taken, the other evening, with scenes of predation -- sharks feeding on seals, tigers stalking a herd of ungulants, skuas swooping menacingly through a penguin rookery. And, porn or not, that baboon colony clearly got ol' Abs in the mood.

Speaking of the survival of the fittest, Chef Jerub has outdone himself lately. Pesto-crusted salmon with French lentil stew, asparagus; his adaptation of Nigella's roast chicken with garlic and lemon. Yeah, he's good. Every time I post about his culinary prowess I remember the caption that appeared under John when the Beatles first appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show: "Sorry girls, he's married."