Fatty

Ever since moving to Lynnwood I have loathed squirrels. I am very close to poisoning them but we have a dog and she would eat the poison and die herself. So those squirrels get to live another day. Our neighbors have a BB gun and will randomly walk outside onto their deck and go pop-pop-pop like crazy. I like this but I realize they are most likely scaring the squirrels into my yard.
You see, they eat my pumpkins. I have been trying to grow pumpkins for over 3 years now. The first year we moved in the middle of growing and my plant died. The second year the squirrels started macking on the buds. They just took 1 bite but it was enough to kill the pubescent pumpkin. This year I built a mondo squirrel proof cage, 7 months pregnant mind you. It kept out the squirrels but it also kept out the bees. None of the flowers were pollinated and nothing grew.
We have had a squirrel living in our ceiling as well. He resides just above our dining room. He would scratch and scratch and scratch like crazy. It drove us crazy. We would whack the ceiling scaring it temporarily but it always came back. Always. We finally figured out where it was entering the house and we blocked the entrance with some heavy duty fire logs. It worked temporarily. That squirrel worked and worked on those logs until he moved them enough to get back into his domain. James finally went up there and nailed the entrance hole shut. We didn't care if he was sealed up in the hole, although we really hoped he wasn't. Chaos ensued for a couple days when he realized he was blocked out. To this day he keeps checking on it, trying to get in.
When I hear him scratching around up there I go out and scare the crap out of it. I bang a piece of wood underneath him on the deck roof and he goes clambering across the roof. One time he full on leapt off the roof flying. I laughed so hard. Another time, he got me. I took Will out. We hit the roof with the wood and heard him scurry across the deck roof only to run back and jump onto the house roof. After he was gone we started to poke around on the deck. That fucker came tearing ass back, only this time he was scurrying along the deck railing. It was 9am and I let out a scream. I was mostly scared it would attack Will or me. He ran off and I started to laugh hysterically. I never scream and reliving the moment was hilarious.
Our adventures with this squirrel have dubbed him fatty. He now visits us daily because, against our will, we are feeding him. I bought a bag of birdseed to do a Pinterest (fail) project with Will. The leftover birdseed bag was punctured by Fatty I am sure. The spilling bag was put into a bucket. This bucket rests on a shelf in the greenhouse. Fatty visits it many times a day for long periods of time. I now get excited when he is there. I let Will know and he runs over to the sliding glass door and yells "Faddy!". I simply love hearing him say that. We then try and scare him but it hardly works. It's extremely fun. Once he sees us he leaves his buffet and scurries around the deck. He knocks over the watering cans and scares himself. He tries to be coy and climb up the back of the greenhouse shelves although the front shelves are easier and just as accessible. Will and I laugh and just keep calling him fatty. Everything he does we say aloud. "Fatty is climbing the shelves", "fatty is getting fat", "fatty knocked over the can", "fatty is leaving", "bye-bye fatty". It's entertaining but I still hate him.
James and I want to torture him more. We have thought about hiding the food, moving it, putting a fake squirrel in the bucket, having something pop out while he is eating. I might just lace the area with cayenne pepper. I read it was a good deterrent to them eating plants. Poor fatty. Perhaps he will just get so fat that it kills him. Then I would be quite satisfied.