"there's a truth that sanity denies…"-Sprung Monkey

Varmints! I have Varmints in my lawn! What the hell am I supposed to do about that?

For most people, varmint control is a family honored tradition.

"Son, today I'm gonna talk to you about gopher control."

"Whew! Mom said we were gonna talk about sex."

That wasn't my dad. My dad had the sex talk instead, so I had to learn about varmints from the kids at school. They were too busy smoking pot ant talking about sex to be much varmint use. I did try to barter Dad's sex knowledge once, but the best I could do was to parley it into how "how to build a bong with a paper cup and an aluminum ashtray."

Valuable knowledge for some, but for the guy staring at dirt clump lumps around his lawn it ain't much good.

So I'm an undereducated statistic. The American school system let me down. Varmints, 1; Rob, 0. It's funny, because when you're young, you never care. Oh I believed them when they said I'd need algebra growing up, and I know how to slay a mean Grendal, but rodent control?

My educated guess was to live in the pristine house: picket fence, 1 wife 2.5 Biblically named kids: Ruth, Mark, Lu. There would be no critters of grass destruction in my lawn.

Yet here I am. Reality's termites have gnawed through that fantasy. I've got gophers. Mr. and Mrs. Fred Grandy are sipping Mint Juleps on my lawn beneath a turf-love boat parasol.

I'm wondering if their bitching about their "human" problem. I don't think so.

See while you're married it's always easier to deal with these things. It's a team thing, and it's almost like those problems don't exist. Oh, sure you have other problems:

"Why are we watching the Ya Ya Sisterhood again?"

"Shut up. Hobbit-boy, you're not one to ask these questions."

"Who used the last strip of toilet paper?"

"The cats?"

Those are the pressing matters during marriage. The things that set you at odd. Yard Varmints? They're nothing. Even if neither one of you knows how to deal with them.

I no longer have to worry about the last strip of toilet paper. If it's gone, I blame the gophers. Ya Ya sisterhood? I have a remote control to cure that nonsense. Nope, Those are the problems plaguing Gopher and his wife. The human trying to exterminate them hasn't even created a blip on their radar.

I know that because their busy in my lawn setting up a movie screen and surround system. It looks like they're inviting neighbors over for Love Boat reruns. I'll give them this: Those gophers have a great surround system...