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Barmy Blue's Bland Blog

Once Again I Return

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Pretentious title? It was the best I could come up with. It's 6:33am.
Haven't had to really type for months. Not typing for a long time. My desk hasn't really been clear since Christmas. Well, the part that leads to the keyboard. The other half got more crap on it because I had to get it out of the way.

So. Anyway. I haven't been here for ages. And I figured I should cover a few things. But since I ramble a lot and can go into a conversational labyrinth I know this would end up having to be split into 5 parts or something and I don't think it would be very fair to dump all that on the same day. It'd also take a few hours to write and I'd lose threads of conversation so you won't get a full and hopefully satisfying story. And I know the amount I usually write must be a chore to read. It makes sense to me because I know what I'm talking about but giving an accurate enough picture for the story is something I forget sometimes so I imagine my entries must be confusing to read, especially if they're newcomers who aren't used to my style. Can I call it a style? I guess anything's a style if you think about it.

Back to the point.
I've thought about picking the relevant events and writing them up in their own separate entries. That way each event will be easier to read. I hope. And shorter.
But I don't feel comfortable dumping each one on the same day and I will fatigue in writing. So how about every day then? Well I don't much like that idea either. I feel like I'd be hogging the homepage even though I'm sure you would be kind/understanding and not mind it but I just don't feel right doing that. It feels rude to me somehow. So how about every other day? Maybe. Then it gives anyone else who might want to write an entry space and if no one writes a new entry between mine then at least I left them the chance to break up a page full of Bluebiird Bluebiird Bluebiird I could go on but you get the idea. But me being me I doubt I'd keep it up every 2 days. When ever I write a blog it's an as and when thing and usually I've thought about it for a few days at least. Hey. Write this up. Do it. Do it. DO IT! Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. If I don't or the longer I leave it the more the memory degrades though so the less interesting/accurate it is.

So That's my plan for this. An entry about a specific thing/things over a few weeks as and when I feel like filling it in.
But so I don't forget what I want to document here's a list of stuff to come hopefully;

- Christmas (of course)
- Update on my parent's health (sure why not)
- What's been going on with the dog (oh boy. That's still ongoing)
- Things breaking (multiple things in quick succession)
- The boiler breaking (which will have it's own entry but ties into the item above)
- My vegetables (did I tell you I was trying to grow vegetables? I must have)
- My future plans (sure why not. Let's hope I actually try to achieve them though. Mostly involving vegetables for this year)
- New Year (maybe if I can remember anything worth telling)
(My opinions on current events will not be making an appearance because enough people give their opinions on social media as it is and everyone can make up their own minds about things)
- My current project (patching stuff up. Already harder than I thought. This is why you don't mess with things. It uncovers a world of problems you didn't know about even though it's better to deal with them sooner than later)
- My family's happenings (from what we've been told)
- A sprinkling of joyful optimism heavily peppered with self loathing as my mood sees fit

I think that should be it. Maybe the very short tale of Stumpy and his furniture to lift moods?

The smaller events/stories may not get their own entry and be lumped together but that's about it. I can't think of anything else for now.

Ah well. You've stuck with me this long so I'll put one in now.

Stumpy is a fox. I'm sure I've told you about him before. He's a he. I know that much. I've seen him pee (males **** their legs like dogs. Females squat like *****es (...hm Don't know why I'm surprised the first one is censored. It makes sense. Even though it's the correct term for the subject matter I know why the second is censored)) and even if I hadn't it's pretty obvious he's a boy if you have good lighting (I usually see him at night). The stump tail makes it so that certain attributes are NOT left to the imagination.
Stumpy is so named because he has a stump for a tail. I don't know what happened to it. But 2 years ago now I remember seeing a fox. There were a few. That was the year we had Prince in the garden (the little fox who slept in out garden. I think he's dead now. I'm sure I told you about why I think that) so there were a few foxes around.
I couldn't tell any of them apart except for Prince because if it was in my garden it was probably Prince. Or the Vixen but Prince being younger meant he was bright orange while Vixen was more dull (and clearly he's a boy and she's a girl. Since I could see him in daylight and he'd sit facing the door you could clearly see that he was NOT female)...This makes it sound like I have a fixation with fox genitalia doesn't it

So walking the dog I'd see a few foxes sometimes. Probably yearlings exploring and looking for new territory. I saw one with an injured tail. It was hanging down like a sad dog and the fox didn't seem able to lift it. I worried about the fox but in that way where you worry but do nothing (in this case because it was the best case scenario for me. This was a way from my house and I didn't know the full range of the fox and even if I could catch it the poor thing would be too stressed). After a while a lively fox with a stump tail appeared in the same area. He roamed quite far (unless there's more than one stump tailed fox) and was easy to recognize. The stump clearly didn't slow him down at all. I don't know if the fox with the injured tail was Stumpy or not and I don't know how he lost his tail. Either someone took it off for him (like a vet or a cruel human), it came off in an accident (like a car ran over it or another fox bit it or something) or he chewed it off himself (most likely if it was injured and a vet didn't get to him. The wild is brutal)
The stump tail seems (to me) to give him a bit of a swagger and I know he gets by well enough. I know this for two reasons. He's made it a couple of years (unless there are other stumpys) and he ignores food when I throw it sometimes. And when he does take something he caches it. I know this because I once gave him a venison cube dog treat (after much coaxing) and he ran off with it and I heard a weird noise. I surmised it to be a nearby front garden with those little stones and he was burying the treat for later. Smart boy.

Sometimes, usually in the summer, the foxes will lay in the road at night and it worries us because cars have sped around here before and once in a while I can hear them in the distance, and I can't stand the thought of the foxes being hit. Some think of them as vermin but I love them. Sure they cause trouble but they're curious and intelligent creatures. They like to explore and play and it's why they're so adaptable. I'll quite often say to one as we're walking along maybe trying o follow it a little "watch out for cars" and "don't trust people" not even me. People have put out poisoned meat before that dogs picked up. Don't know what their intentions were but I wouldn't put it past some people to think of trying to poison foxes.
When I see one in the road sometimes I'll approach to scare it away but they come back when I've gone anyway. The biggest offender is Stumpy.
I'll get pretty close (not close enough to touch or anything. Just closer than I think I should based on the distance other foxes give me) and he'll look at me with a face that seems to say in a grumpy old man way "what do you want? leave me alone". He seemed kind of lethargic and looked a little scraggly so we figure he's getting old. I'd feed him some of Yuki's joint treats when I could. Now I don't see him doing that so I wonder if it's a Summer thing and he doesn't seem lethargic from what I can see.

A big reason he might have been like that it because we have a huge mange outbreak in the foxes now. I haven't seen what I call a "scabby" or a "skin-back" fox for a while. I carry dried sprats to feed them if I see them. I want them strong for Winter. A hairless fox will not survive long if it gets to freezing. I looked into various ways to help them and I started carrying the treats to bribe them into partly trusting me so I could slip them medicine. Only trouble with that is you don't know if anyone else is doing the same thing and I couldn't get something from the vet (what with social distancing and all, only one person allowed in at a time) and I don't want to get something online because you don't know what you're getting or who you're really dealing with and I don't want my banking information or address out there too much. So, after more hopeless research, I determined the best thing to do was feed them when I see them. I shouldn't leave food out because then they won't forage and lose territory and it will attract other animals and/or encourage them to seek food from people and not every human will be as nice as me. But if they can be fed up then they might be strong enough to fight the illness. I really hope so. The only one who hasn't seemed affected is Baby Girl (our new resident yearling after Prince) but that's because she's young and gets regular food (she'd sit by the door in the evening when she knew we'd get food in the Summer) and mum throws out the food that the dog doesn't eat for them. We haven't seen Baby Girl for a while now. That is how it goes in Winter so she might also have succumbed to the mange. I say mange. I'm not 100% certain but hairless foxes is most likely mange. They can have the mange mite months before you notice the hair loss and they can be lethargic and not afraid of humans if it progresses too far. So that's why I wonder if Stumpy was just being lazy in the Summer or unwell)

Back to the main story.

Stumpy would lay in the road at night in the Summer. I'd see him walking the dog.
One day he refused to move until I was practically on top of him and even then he hung around closer than usual. He was laying on a scrap of carpet someone dumped. It was almost in the middle of the road and if he took that long to move for me what would he do with a speeding car. So wanting to cause as little disturbance as possible I kick/dragged the carpet closer to the curb. Not all the way. Just enough to have him shielded by parked cars (I hoped). He looked annoyed by the while thing. But the next few days for a short time in the evening I'd see him laying on that carpet. He didn't seem to stay long but clearly he liked it. Pretty obvious why. Either it had an appealing scent already, it now smelled like him so was clearly now his or he liked the texture. Surely it's nicer than a hard floor. So as long as he wasn't in danger I was happy to see him on his spot. He seemed very content. But I did worry about it getting soggy in the rain and about it being cleared up. Not long after Stumpy's carpet was gone. So great was the loss that I imagined Stumpy felt I actually thought of cutting a scrap of some old carpet we have and putting it out for him. But that's dumping which shouldn't have been done in the first place (other stuff had been dumped but Stumpy had chosen the carpet as his) and it wouldn't be there long before it was cleared up sooner or later anyway. What would I do, keep putting out bits of carpet like a lunatic? And I guarantee you that as soon as I did that someone would've seen me and I'd get done for dumping even though it seems that no one else does because they do it all the time round here.

So for a while Stumpy was carpet-less and it didn't seem to bother him.

Then a small sofa was dumped in the same area (there's an alcove near the end of the street. The owners put up a sign saying CCTV and a camera but clearly it hasn't deterred anyone. I wonder if the camera in even real though I do worry about being seen on it feeding foxes and following cats (there's a little cat who follows me sometimes. He's sweet but troublesome)).
I didn't see Stumpy interact with it but I imagined it to be a nice spot for him, since he liked the carpet so much a sofa is a huge step up (literally and figuratively).
One time walking past it in the daylight I saw light hairs all over it (it was a dark colour so it showed) that looked very fox coloured but I didn't get my hopes up. The owners could've had a dog or cat and I never noticed the hairs before. I hadn't walked past it often.
Then one night I was lucky enough to see something on the sofa. A fox. It looked at me with the same bleary eyed stare that says "you woke me up from my nap. Do I really have to move?" of Stumpy. I've only seen Stumpy look at me like that. It moves. Stump tail confirmed. Stumpy now has a sofa and he does use it. That makes me happy.
Because it's a bulky item it stays there for ages. I think it lost it's appeal with the rain (this was in Autumn) and I never saw him near it again but that doesn't mean he didn't still use it. I was sad to see it had gone some time before Christmas. Can't remember exactly when. Maybe November? I really don't know. It might have been a day or two before I noticed.
I feel bad that Stumpy lost his sofa but at least he made use of it. It should NEVER have been in the street to begin with but I like that it was in some way useful to the animals while it was there, make the best of a bad situation kind of thing.

There. You see what I mean? That was supposed to be a SHORT story
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Comments

  1. Danik 2016's Avatar
    Hi Bluebiird,

    I liked your fox stories, specially as I havenīt seen a living fox in my life. I suppose Stumpy feels more secure to use the sofa during the night, when dangerous humans are supposed to be asleep.

    Donīt mind the homepage. There are so few people posting this day. Every post from you will be wellcome!