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Everyone: this is Yasle, the Coyote. Yasle, this is everyone.

Now that proper introductions are taken care of, "Hooray!" I returned the MSS to my editor last week. It is strange now having free time on the weekends that have, for the past two months, been consumed by editing drama. As I am one of the queen diva dufuses, you can imagine how dramatic it got, too.

Today it is beautiful. The redwood forests are awe-inspiring to be sure. But to LIVE in them is another story altogether. Guess what I got to do today? Scare a bear away? Nah - the plums aren't ripe yet; and, as far as I am concerned, little bear can have all the plums he wants. His head is as big as our largest dog is long...pretty darned big. And plums beat Pampers any day (yes, bears love them, too - eew). Since the freaks at Camp Marigold (yes, I said, Camp Marigold) insist on leaving their tweaker-assed dumpster open, the bears have a pampers buffet which is heinous to clean up.

Has the two-cougar tag-team returned to terrorize the neighborhood? Nah. Not yet. I suspect the lame one who had commissioned the services of the younger, stronger, one has since passed away. And the deer are plentiful this year, as are the elk. They have no need to come into the lowlands to feed. Oh, except for the one that was almost seven feet head-to-tail that freaked out the tourists on the bridge because he had taken down an elk alone, dragged it to the river's edge, and was casually feeding and guarding it in full view and broad daylight. Now that's one cocky cougar for sure.

Have the coyotes been frolicking? Of course. They are out there every day and night. We have a new species of rabbit here - we named them "risk-boos" (boo, being short, and Russian, for boonya - bunny) - because they creep out of their blackberry vine havens en masse at dawn and dusk to feed on the tender shoots. Yasle and the b.f. (boyfriend) lurk about and unsuccessfully - except once; and trust me, a rabbit scream at 5:30 a.m. is terrifying - try to catch dinner. They have also rabidly pursued a covey of quails whose numbers had dwindled by fall of last year; but whose population have since rebounded to about 20.

Yasle is being all hormonal now, though, because she had a litter. We are dying to see the cubs, too. Her teats have shrunk to being barely visible, so we know they must be almost weaned. She will show them to us once they are fully weaned. But now, she shuns Sapa, our youngest dog and her once-favorite playmate. Sapa tries to get her worked up, but it never works. So we bust out the frisbee and throw it around until the mosquitoes and threat of west nile virus become overwhelming. Sapa gets a good run out of it. Once Yasle lets her little ones go, though, I am certain she and Sapa will resume their yardly-antics.

No, what I had to do today is...WASH THE HOUSE. Yes, you read that correctly...WASH the house. You see one thing that grows really well here is...mold; moss; and other select cooties that thrive to the ultimate detriment of one's respiratory health.

So there was Lisa, dogs in tow, scrubbing the house as one would a car or countertop, making all the icky red and green slime disappear. Gross ick plah. Cootie bomb - good lord if we wanted something with which to wage biological warfare, I swear, this is it. It is an untapped resource and supremely gross so as to offend even the hardiest of the "Man, you call that gross? Let me tell you about the time when..." crowd.

And here in the wild wild west - so wild the population of this county is, like, a thousand people in an area as large as Rhode Island - icky things grow well, thick, and take over. And if you are a bigfoot fanatic - that famous footage that started the trend was shot along the Klamath River - home to the Tribe for whom I serve as in-house counsel.

Face it, there are things in wild places best left unknown, mysterious, and not residing on one's house...EVER. But it was a great two-hour workout; and now I can barely lift my hands to type this, but the sun was shining, and I could not stand to remain corraled indoors.

Still, it was like the wild slime beast that ate Pittsburgh. Add the enhancement of the banana slugs which are rife - and stretch to almost a foot long - EEEEEW. I defy you to compare the sensation of accidentally stepping on one to ANYTHING that did not originate in a Steven Spielberg sci-fi extravaganza. No, Spielberg is too mainstream - they are the "Pulp Fiction" of cootie animals. And they are bright, banana yellow. They're cool in their own way, but what they leave on one's house is...oh so bad.

I felt like soaking in a tub full of iodine after completing my house-washing mission. My feet had become entangled in blackberry vines (which shred flesh, so eating the berries is my humble revenge) which tore right through my pants and make mincemeat out of my ankle.

Gushing blood, covered in slime, and with bluejays cackling their amusement, I straggled to the garage; replaced the housewashing brush; the bucket; and my sanity as I fled to the creature comforts of author's den and paying bills.