eldhús

So far no pandas. Not even red pandas. But as consolation, perhaps, there are raccoons in plenty. They seem to live in the wedged-in space behind a wooden fence visible out my window. It is a nest of little ones seen to by a pleasantly round and unhurried-seeming mother raccoon. Today, when she stepped too far off, the little ones set up a shockingly loud alarm of screetchy chittering audible a block away. When she returned, the gap in the fence that is the entrance to the den was suddenly full of a great lashing of tiny ringtails, giving the impression that she was a plump cook racing to the stove, where a neglected pot had begun to boil over.