“Now be a good vegetarian and come into the kitchen with me to see if the bacon’s done.”

OUT BIRD WATCHING
Julian whirled and spied through his binoculars. “Blue-green vireo, third ponderosa pine, eleven o’clock.” . . . I pulled up my borrowed binoculars, then had to put them down to count one, two, three ponderosa pines, then put them back up and tried to figure if the tree was a clock, which branch would be right before noon? While I was doing all this, I did catch a glimpse of turquoise flitting away from the tree. Branch eleven was empty. By the time I took my binoculars down, everybody was giving me patronizing looks.
“Oh, look! A nest of voles!” I craned my neck back to see what new flock of flying creatures we were now going to encounter. I felt a slight tickling around my feet, but I was determined to see the birds in question this time. I said “I don’t see any voles.” “Well Mom, your standing on them.” . . . Rodents. They were jumping on my feet. I screamed bloody murder.