Bridge Views: The Best Laid Traps are Planned

Unfortunately, last Friday’s sunset sail down the Hudson on the A.J. Meerwald with the Fort Lee Common Sense Society was a washout. Literally.

Driving through the unrelenting sheets of pouring rain up the Palisade Interstate Parkway there was a sneaking suspicion that the cruise might be called off due to rain, but on we drove. However, the breathtaking bolt of lightning and jolting clap of thunder that escorted me around the final descending curve of the Palisades was convincing enough to ensure that the scheduled sail would indeed be cancelled.

Common Sense Society members, Tom Meyers and Lou Azzollini, stood in the rising tide of the parking lot that the Hudson was now draining into, the sails of the Meerwald bobbing and weaving like a mirage in the fog behind them, redirecting people to turn around and go back up the Palisades. The sail was officially cancelled.  

“Great,” opined I. “There goes my Monday story.”

So, around I turned to head back to Fort Lee. The truth was, I was actually anxious to get home to check on the trap that was sitting baited on my attic floor. I was on a mission to capture a pesky attic-squatting squirrel.

When I first heard the early-morning squirrel acrobatics on the floor above my bedroom, I was mildly annoyed. However, after it ate its way through the zippered cover of my multi-shelved shoe racks (yes, plural on the shoe racks) my anger soared with the temperature.

Upon realizing that it had chewed its way through most of the shoes on one of the racks, my inner-Fort Lee was unleashed, and I turned vigilante.

There was no need to call an exterminator. That’s not how Fort Lee rolls. We were home to Murder Inc., for goodness sake! We take care of our own exterminations. We set traps. We get rid of the body. We don’t air our dirty laundry in public. Win-Win.

Baited inside the trap was a slice of Wonder Bread slathered with peanut butter. Let the waiting begin.

Day One: Nada. Not even a nibble of the crust.

Day Two: Bread was nibbled, spit out, trap door still open.

Day Three: We could hear the squirrel scurrying around, but it meticulously avoided the trap.

Clearly, this squirrel was neither fond of peanut butter nor Wonder Bread. I had to come up with a different plan. I just wasn’t sure what that plan was.

The answer was handed to me by the offender. While sitting outside on the deck I saw her poke her head out of the hole in the roof and look directly at me. It took me a minute to focus and realize that secured in the chiseled inscisors of the Sciurus Carolinensis was the satin bow from one of my Madden platform heels and what appeared to be a label from a gnawed box that had once held a jar of Nutella.

“Game on she-rodent!” (Who else but a female would shun peanut butter for Nutella and platform Maddens?)

Now that I knew the mentality of the genus I was dealing with, I got serious. So, before heading down to the Hudson for what was to be a spectacular sunset cruise on the A.J. Meerwald, and against the protests of my husband, who swore I was crazy, I laid an orphaned Betsey Johnson Diskko Glitter stiletto alongside a slice of Parisienne Bakery brioche lavished with Nutella.

Upon returning home from our soaked-out sail I could hear the sound of the success as soon as I opened the front door. From the belly of the attic descended the irate screams of the she-squirrel clearly trapped.

And there she was, sidling the Betsey Johnson stiletto, her face covered in Nutella. Now it was time to dispose of the body and, following in the footsteps of many who came before me, I took the culprit to an undisclosed part of the Palisades where she could partake in a woodsy witness protection program, which is more of a chance than many others who were dumped there were afforded. Allegedly.

Once on a secure part of the Palisades, away from prying eyes, I released the spring of the trap door. I was surprised not so much by the alacrity with which she fled into the small portion of open field that was once home to , but the fact that she did so with a Betsey Johnson stiletto firmly clasped in her mouth.  

So, if you’re hiking the Palisades, and you happen upon a lone Betsey Johnson Diskko Glitter stiletto, take it as a subtle reminder of Fort Lee’s infamous legacy of (alleged) disposal of problems. And watch out for Nutella loving she-squirrels because you know what they say:

You can take the squirrel out Fort Lee, but you can never really take Fort Lee out of the squirrel. Or something like that. Allegedly.