A clarification

It has come to my attention* that I may have given you the impression that I hate animals. This is a falsehood. True, I spent a good ten minutes yesterday trying to assure that a mother raccoon laid her baby nest anywhere but in the insulation above my son's bed. True, I may have tried to accomplish this by banging on pots and pans every time I saw her until she retreated out of sight for the day.

But people, I love animals.

For example, I love snakes. It's true. I had a garter snake named Snakey in my classroom** and I spoiled that baby so rotten with live fish that he wouldn't take crickets and other things garter snakes love in the wild.

Wait, did that sound like I hate fish? I love fish. I used to want to BE a fish. Every time I went in the ocean from ages 3 to 15 now, I walked very slowly and deliberately in and then dove under because I had a secret hidden hope that I was really a mermaid and that THIS TIME, upon contact with my natural habitat, I would sprout fins and swim away. After hearing Michael Reisman talk about how much he loves his fish, I consulted him extensively and bought Tink her own goldfish and who do you think feeds Filly nightly and cleans/refills his tank weekly monthly biannually???

Here is a list of other animals I had as pets in my classroom at one time or another:
a Mexican red-kneed tarantula
baby opossums
a bearded dragon
leopard frogs
painted lady butterflies
an African pygmy hedgehog***

Oh, Hedgie. I loved Hedgie so much that when Hedgie got sick, I brought him home and tried to nurse him back to health on a diet of freshly steamed carrots and boiled chicken until Thor told me Hedgie was not welcome on the kitchen counter any more.

So there. See? I am an animal lover and anyone who thinks otherwise is -- What's that? Okay, I can see where this might mislead you into thinking I hate squirrels.

Well.

Um.

Yeah. I can't deny it. I do hate squirrels. Little squeaking flightless pigeons.

Edited to add: As I am reading the comments this afternoon, something is crawling around above me in a part of my house that HAS NO ATTIC. Whatever it is is scratching and biting and must be in my roof somehow and, yes, I admit, I hate it too, even if it is not a squirrel. Not to worry, my boyfriend from Animal Control is coming soon.

* Darn you, real life peanut gallery!
** To be more specific, I had Snakeys # 1 through 3.
*** yes, I know it's not legal to own hedgehogs in some states. Illinois isn't one of those states. All of these animals, in fact, were checked, etc., and okay to have. And they were very well cared for by grown-ups, not second graders.