Murder Most Canine!

I walked outside the other morning and was shocked to discover that my two seemingly sweet, harmless dogs had MURDERED my scarecrow. And they didn't just murder him, they tore him limb from limb! My babies are killers....


At first I thought, "Well, at least they decided to do it now, while scarecrows are on sale." But then Sweet Husband pointed out that if we get a new scarecrow and put him out without protection, we would (literally) be throwing him to the dogs. We'd probably have another murder on our conscience quite shortly. But given the way our yard is situated and how devious our two little monsters are, it's going to be hard to make the new scarecrow safe.

We could get him a bodyguard, but I think it would get spendy to have someone stand outside all day. Maybe we'll ask for protection for him from the Roman god Priapus.

Priapus was the original scarecrow. Although legend says he was the son of Dionysus and Aphrodite, Priapus was born ugly. Farmers noticed that his statue seemed to scare birds, so they placed figures of him in their fields and gardens. Eventually Priapus became known as the patron god of gardens.

Then again, maybe we could scare the dogs into leaving our new scarecrow alone.

Priapus was a benevolent scarecrow, but some of the stories and legends surrounding scarecrows since are terrifying. Sources say that the Headless Horseman from the Legend of Sleepy Hollow was probably based on a scarecrow, and the Scarecrow character from the Batman comics--who got a revival this year in the new Batman movie--literally scares his victims to death.

But the thing is, most scarecrows these days are just a little to lovable to be very scary. Like Scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz, our new scarecrow would probably be a pretty lovable fellow who has trouble scaring a crow, let alone our two little homicidal canines.

Maybe we'll just give up on scarecrows for the year and put up a mean looking turkey instead.