In a few days, Les UDs leave for their summer stay at – oh, we’re intimates now; I’ll tell you the place’s name – Budy (Polish for shacks). Budy is their little house in upstate New York. Here they sit around reading and avoiding the hellishness of August in our nation’s capital.
In the middle of August, they go to the Bear Cafe in Bearsville (a pretty ride through Catskill Park) to celebrate UD‘s birthday.
I’ve already mentioned that upstate neighbors have warned Les UDs about more bears than usual this season, and here’s a story about bears in Bearville.
This guy, a mentor at SUNY Empire State (I think mentor means professor), keeps getting his house trashed by bears.
Following their first bear invasion… the Knowles family locked the windows and doors and left home for a dinner gathering.
They returned a few hours later to find a kitchen casement window had been torn open, its lock twisted into uselessness. Their home had been trashed all over again.
The family cleaned up their home and went to bed, hoping they’d have no more visits from bears.
But the next day was the worst. Knowles and his family returned home at 7 p.m. to find the house completely ransacked. The bears had trashed 7-year-old Takemi’s bedroom, rummaging through his closet, even defecating on his bed.
Two guys from the Department of Environmental Conservation showed up, with guns.
“I’m feeling terrible, about to witness an execution,” Knowles later wrote in an e-mail.
But the shots missed their mark. The bear scampered off into the woods behind Knowles’ home. Thirty minutes later, the DEC men determined that both shots were “clean misses” and the bear had not been injured. The trapped cub was released.
The experts now hope the mother bear has been spooked enough to stay away from homes in the area.
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A commenter on the article writes:
I feel much safer now that we know 2 DEC officers can’t hit a standing bear.
July 25th, 2012 at 2:21PM
Not recently.
July 26th, 2012 at 5:52PM
If you live in Bearville (the clue is in the name) and leave granola fixings on your kitchen table (as noted in one of the captions of the slideshow), you’re gonna get bears coming in.
July 26th, 2012 at 6:58PM
Polish Peter: Even WE don’t leave granola fixings about, and bears haven’t come to Garrett Park yet.