Althouse: At the Blonde Squirrel Café...

April 10, 2013

At the Blonde Squirrel Café...

... scamper in.

45 comments:

bleh said...: That squirrel should follow the twitter of NYC's future mayor, Anthony Weiner. She might find the nuts she's looking for.; 4/10/13, 2:27 PM
Unknown said...: Awwwwww. Cute.; 4/10/13, 2:29 PM
Oso Negro said...: This thread has great potential for mischief.; 4/10/13, 2:33 PM
Fritz said...: Here at the Smithsonian we have population of black squirrels. I keep trying to get a picture but they continue to elude me.

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2011-04-01/local/35207995_1_black-squirrels-gray-squirrels-sciurus; 4/10/13, 2:34 PM
bagoh20 said...: Isn't this a great picture of Putin?

Is it my birthday?; 4/10/13, 2:35 PM
Eric the Fruit Bat said...: Only its hairdresser knows for sure.; 4/10/13, 2:37 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: President Obama declared yesterday national Equal Pay day.

It would have been nice if he had at least paid lip service to the equal work part.

On the other hand, at least he didn't declare it national To Each According to their Need day.; 4/10/13, 2:38 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: An Educhers blonde sighting.; 4/10/13, 2:38 PM
madAsHell said...: I've never seen a yellow squirrel.

I live in the Pacific N.W. The squirrels in my neighborhood are gray with white underneath.

I travel 200 miles south across the Columbia to visit my in-laws, and the squirrels are almost all red. They also appear to be about 15% larger.; 4/10/13, 2:43 PM
Nonapod said...: Chubby squirrel regrets nothing; 4/10/13, 3:01 PM
rehajm said...: Boston's Public Garden has a black squirrel.; 4/10/13, 3:08 PM
edutcher said...: Yes, but does it have more fun?

And The Blonde is no squirrel, Lem.

bagoh20 said...

Isn't this a great picture of Putin?

Is it my birthday?

The look on Angie Merkel's face is almost as good, "You call those tits? where I come from, those aren't even mosquito bites".; 4/10/13, 3:14 PM
BarrySanders20 said...: Another installment of the ebony and ivory theme this week.; 4/10/13, 3:15 PM
Ann Althouse said...: This squirrel, which I've been trying repeatedly to photograph, has a red tinge that the photo doesn't show. It's really a strawberry blonde. Very light but with a reddish cast.; 4/10/13, 3:15 PM
Hagar said...: With the hype about impending agreement shaping up in Congress about expanded background checks for gun sales, it should be noted that at present said "background checks" are mostly smoke. The NBC article on it says your name will be checked against the Federal database for oustanding warrants for your arrest and such information as the states may have submitted about persons adjudged mentally impaired, which is not much and only from some states. The article does not say, but I would assume that once you have had a warrant against you, your name will stay in the system forever, whether you were later found innocent or not. And that is it.

I think we can see where this is going. The next time there is an incident with someone like the W-VA shooter, there will be a media full-court press for having everybody in the system with all kinds of information attached to be provided by the states on pain of having their highway funds witheld. And the quality of the information will be even less than the TSA's "no-fly" list, you won't know it is there until you are hit with it, and you will not be able to get it removed anymore than you get your name off the internet once it has appeared there.; 4/10/13, 3:15 PM
Bob Ellison said...: At the National Zoo in Washington, DC, there's a little plaque that talks about how some guy a long time ago (1800s?) made a big effort to revive the population of the grey squirrel in America, which he found was being inexorably crowded out by the red squirrel.

I read it twice to make sure I had it right. Very strange.; 4/10/13, 3:34 PM
virgil xenophon said...: @Bob Ellison/

Bob, it's just the reverse--it's the greys that are crowding out the larger reds--better check your memory/sources.; 4/10/13, 3:49 PM
Bob Ellison said...: virgil Xenophon, I know! But the National Zoo plaque (sp?) says otherwise. I'll have to go there and take a picture, I guess. It's bizarre.; 4/10/13, 3:54 PM
virgil xenophon said...: PS: Speaking of squirrels, FYI the little town of Olney, Illinois has the only WHITE squirrel pop in the US (check it out on Wiki) and Illinois the only State in the Union to have both white & black populations (the latter populating the Quad Cities area on the Ill/IA border.); 4/10/13, 3:55 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: Vancouver has black squirrels all over the place. Impossible? Improbable? Don't believe it? I won't even prompt it for black [stanley park squirrels]; 4/10/13, 3:57 PM
Lucien said...: We pay protection (actually, it's just peanuts to us) to a very charismatic squirrel who chases our cats around. But then a Blue Jay comes down for a bite and scares off the squirrel.; 4/10/13, 4:33 PM
AllenS said...: Ann Althouse said...
This squirrel, which I've been trying repeatedly to photograph, has a red tinge that the photo doesn't show. It's really a strawberry blonde. Very light but with a reddish cast.

That sounds like a fox squirrel. They are a little bit bigger than a gray squirrel.; 4/10/13, 5:23 PM
AllenS said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 4/10/13, 5:23 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: Vancouver has black squirrels all over the place.

Yea... but are they authentically black?; 4/10/13, 5:27 PM
AllenS said...: LOL, Lem.; 4/10/13, 5:32 PM
Unknown said...: Probably a dilution of red coat in a red squirrel....very pretty!

Here in GA all light coated housepets look like that from the clay. When I first started practicing as a vet here I wondered why I was seeing so many red dogs and cats! When I realized the stupidity of my observation I confessed to one of my techs...and she laughingly told me that her son didn't understand why the pictures of elephants in books were always grey instead of orange like our Zoo Atlanta elephants.; 4/10/13, 5:35 PM
Unknown said...: Ann, we have a similarly blonde squirrel in our backyard here in Colorado. Very rare, for sure, never seen another one quite like it. You're lucky for having seen/photographed it!; 4/10/13, 5:58 PM
Unknown said...: Ann, we have a similarly blonde squirrel in our backyard here in Colorado. Very rare, for sure, never seen another one quite like it. You're lucky for having seen/photographed it!; 4/10/13, 5:59 PM
Synova said...: My little home town has black squirrels (I think they are genetically gray squirrels.) They never used to. I never saw a single one when I was growing up. All the gray squirrels were gray. And then a black one showed up. Now the black squirrels are all over the place.; 4/10/13, 6:02 PM
Limited Blogger said...: The comments on at the saliva deposit post are too cluttered so I'll put it here.

Ace of Spades reports that the current background-check proposal allows your doctor to put you on the government's "mentally ill" national database (thus barring you from buying a gun) without your even knowing it.

And, that, my friends, is stealth TORT reform.

http://minx.cc/?post=339018; 4/10/13, 6:04 PM
Amartel said...: We have black squirrels and gray squirrels. They squeal at each other all the time and chase each other through the trees but I haven't seen any fur-color wars. They all join forces to drop things on cats who come by. Never seen a blond or ginger squirrel.; 4/10/13, 6:10 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: I just now added 'do not track me' to my brewers. Seamless. It made fast things faster like NOW and zombies cannot track me without mäh ähthoritäh.; 4/10/13, 6:13 PM
Synova said...: Leit, they've had gun confiscations in New York already because someone with a permit was once prescribed a psychotropic (?) drug. Apparently the state got a list of past prescriptions and compared it to the list of current gun permit holders and started sending out "turn in your guns" letters.

But we're paranoid if we think anyone would ever want to come take our guns, or if we object to anything that would put us on a list... such as "background check" expansions that involve the state keeping records.; 4/10/13, 6:29 PM
X said...: hey look over there! GARAGE MAHAL!; 4/10/13, 6:37 PM
Jenner said...: Virgil- not true-white squirrels also found on Yonges Island, SC; 4/10/13, 7:33 PM
madAsHell said...: Vancouver has black squirrels all over the place.

...and 180 miles to the north we have black squirrels.

I've been to Stanley Park several times, but failed to notice the black squirrels. It appears the coyotes in the park prefer the gray squirrels.; 4/10/13, 7:34 PM
madAsHell said...: but are they authentically black?

Cornball squirrels??; 4/10/13, 7:37 PM
kentuckyliz said...: Cornball squirrels made me laugh out loud.

Quad Cities squirrels: I shall have to look for them the next time I'm driving through (to my sister's farm).

Ebony and Ivory
Live together in perfect harmony
Side by side
In the oak trees
Oh Lord
Why can't we!

If you want to be my squirrel
It don't matter if you're black or white; 4/10/13, 7:58 PM
Hagar said...: CBS News did not do their case any favors this evening when they said all this information will be available to the gun shops, which of course is not so. The gun shop employee only gets a yea or a nay from the Federal(?) employee on the other end of the call.

I would also assume that if the expanded background check bill goes through, the parties to a private sale will still have to go through a FFL holder to make the call. At present, getting just a regular FFL is no big deal. Will Congress tighten up those regulations?
Also at this time, as I understand it, there is no record being kept of the calls, and I believe it is against the Federal law to do so. The only thing the Feds have now then is that no gun shop owner in his right mind wishes to be caught not making the call in some undercover operation.

So, how is this going to square with making it a crime for me not to go through the process if I sell a gun to another private person, but I have no way of proving that I did?

Further, expanding the reporting of mentally unstable just to the State authorities is going to make the ACLU and likeminded organizations, such as those of the "mental health community," go bananas.

How is Congress going to come up with something remotely useful that won't be in court for the next couple of decades?; 4/10/13, 8:27 PM
Rusty said...: Ann Althouse said...
This squirrel, which I've been trying repeatedly to photograph, has a red tinge that the photo doesn't show. It's really a strawberry blonde. Very light but with a reddish cast.

Fly tiers pay a premium for squirrel tails that are naturally lighter or darker than normal. Black and white bring the most money.; 4/10/13, 9:06 PM
Alex said...: Squirrels are welfare recipients.; 4/10/13, 9:22 PM
Limited Blogger said...: Oh, Synova, it doesn't even take a drug.

A NY man had his gun license suspended and his guns confiscated -- with no hearing -- when his 10-year old kid had a playground skirmish at school and muttered something about paint ball.

http://www.wivb.com/dpp/news/erie/more-on-suspension-of-mans-gun-permit

But you, dear, are paranoid! Snap, spittle and pop.; 4/10/13, 10:37 PM
Sydney said...: Black squirrels are dominant around here. I sometimes forget squirrels come in other colors. I live near Kent, Ohio, and it seems the black squirrels are a result of academic mischief:

In the United States, the city of Kent, Ohio developed a significant black squirrel population after 10 were legally imported from Canada in February 1961 by biologist Ralph W. Dexter to study whether they would upset the ecosystem on Northeast Ohio. They have driven out native squirrels in many areas, though they peacefully coexist with most other rodent wildlife.; 4/10/13, 10:44 PM
JAL said...: We have white squirrels (not albino) in my neck of the woods. Literally,; 4/11/13, 2:13 AM
JAL said...: Virgil -- Wiki is *wrong*

We have an annual "White Squirrel Festival" and you can get plush white squirrel toys locally. The local radio station is WSQL.

Srsly.; 4/11/13, 2:17 AM