the laws of gravelly

So I'm sitting on my desk working on my blog, when I get a whiff of the most delicious smell.  Okay, maybe delicious isn't the word.  The peep would use that word but for me, delicious smells usually emanate from small tins.  No, this was more of a perfumy scent but not the stinky kind my peep wears.  This was the scent of honeysuckle.

Honeysuckle in October, you say?  In the northern hemisphere??  In Canada???  Yup.  Sometimes the ol' honeysuckle vines will treat us to a second viewing, if you will.  There are never many blooms in the fall but in a good year, you can get two or three.  And since the flowers are so strongly scented, two or three is all it takes.

So, I sat on my desk and closed my eyes and breathed in deeply, taking in the lovely scent of the honeysuckle.  I was just about ready to drift off into la-la land, dreaming of hummers zipping and zapping amidst the flowers, when I heard it.  I heard a crunching and a scrunching and an all-round trunching coming through the very same window as my lovely honeysuckle perfume.  Then came the sound of screeching tires.  MOUSES! I thought to myself. 

I recognised the sound immediately as I've been hearing it, over and over and over again, for the last few months.  It was the sound of someone turning the corner, a little too quickly, out on the street in front of my house. 

It all began a few months ago...  You see, some nincompoop in the department of transportation thought that instead of repairing the corners of the road - where they had been worn down over the years and damaged by big ol' snow plows - properly, they would just fill in the holes at the corners with gravel.  Well, I can sure as mouses tell you that whoever came up with this idea was not the saltiest sardine in the tin.  Yeah, it worked for about...  well...  let's see...  a week.  Then, piece by piece and chunk by chunk, the bits of gravel and whatnot were spread about over the entire road.  Like, what did they think would happen?  Did they think that they could say to that ol' gravel, "Now hear this, you bits of gravel, you stay put!" and that somehow, miraculously, the gravel would listen?  I think not!  MOUSES! 

At first, cars had to turn the corner badly and drive over the piles of gravel to make the icky noises but they don't have to do that anymore.  Since the gravel is no longer confined to the corners, all the cars have to do is drive on the road to go over it.  Yeah...  just the road which, I believe, is where they're supposed to be.  The cars, I mean...  not the bits of gravel.  And if those cars are moving even the slightest bit too fast - which I reckon is anything faster than an elderly turtle on crutches - the tires screech.  Oh, it's a horrible sound, it is...   especially for those of us with sensitive ears, like myself. 

And the road looks just awful.  I'm not allowed on it but if I go through the trees where my peep has planted me a little woodland garden filled with primroses and whatnot, I can see the mess from there.  Yes, one day I trotted over there and sat at the edge of my little woods and looked out, just to see what was making all the commotion.  And what I saw was a big ol' mess.  There was the road with big chunks of gravel spread out all over it.  And the holes the gravel were supposed to be filling?  Well, the holes are clearly visible 'cause there's no gravel in them anymore!  And that would be because the gravel is, like I said, all over the road.

I asked the peep about this ridiculousness and she told me that it wasn't just at the corners of my road where they had done this.  She says they did it in at least two other spots in the subdivision.  Maybe more.  And do you know what?  I believe her.  She wouldn't lie about a silly and ridiculous thing like this.  That's for sure.

You know...   I think that I should go work for the Department of Transportation.  I'm pretty sure I could do a way better job than that ol' unsalted sardine.  You see...  I, Nerissa the cat, understand the laws of gravelly.  I understand that you can't just go putting gravel just any-old-where and expect it to stay put.   But then, I'm a cat.  And we cats are so much smarter about these things than...  well...  you know...  peeps.