Boarding House Owner Disarmed

Sheriff Garrison last Sunday evening responded to a 911 call at Mrs. Sand's Boarding House. When he arrived, he found Mrs. Lois Sand, the owner, sitting on her back porch with a .22 rifle across her lap.

Sheriff Garrison asked why she had called him. She pointed to a squirrel that was pulling an apple footie off her apple, taking a bite from the apple, and dropping both apple and footie. "He's destroying my organic apples," she fumed.

Garrison scratched his head. "And what do you want me to do about it?"

She held up her .22. "If you don't kill that apple robber, I'll use this."

"Isn't that a bit extreme?" he asked.

"No. My shotgun would be. But that would harm some of my apples."

Jay Kills Finch

Miss Agatha Peabody, retired Hillcrest librarian, was sitting on her deck Wednesday, enjoying her late afternoon glass of lemonade, when she screamed in terror. John Schreiber, local author, happened to be walking by with his wife and rushed to her assistance. There, beside her deck, lay a decapitated house finch.

She pointed with a trembling hand at the feathered head beside her deck. "It was a blue jay," she stammered. "He killed it and picked it apart, then flew off with the body, just as you came."

While Marilyn Schreiber consoled Miss Peabody, Schreiber picked up the head. "Not quite the sensational murder we had in Hillcrest a few years ago*, but this should still make The Ironwood Times."

* see Life on the Fly