This guy was making a racket in the tree because there was a cat down below who wanted to steal his avocado. Or maybe the cat wanted to eat him. Who can say for sure?

Whenever I walk past my neighbor’s house, I’ll see an avocado on their lawn. I’ve always wondered where they come from because there are no avocado trees that I can see anywhere around. The first time I saw it, I thought maybe it fell out of the neighbor’s grocery bag as they were schlepping their groceries into the house, but then I started seeing avocados on the wall between our houses, and in my backyard, so that ruled out that hypothesis.

Then, a few days ago, Bonnie and I were sitting out front and saw Mono, the one-eared squirrel that lives in our ficus tree, going about her business. She was dragging a pinecone up into the tree, but came down to take a break and have a snack. She had an avocado buried in the wood chips to eat at her leisure.

Since then, seeing squirrels carrying avocados around has become a common sight. I don’t know why I never saw it before.