Alas, I had hoped that not even responding to their aggravations, I might be rid of the little miscreants, but it was not to be. Point of fact, I know the little monsters have Shanghaied my collection of hose clamps and are creating some sort of a doomsday device that will surely wreak havoc in the garage I worked so hard to resurrect this summer. In fact, I'm fairly certain they are the cause of the recent "fire incident" in the garage, on top of the wood burner.

I'm expecting Brian to be checking here for things I'm sure they've taken from his garage, as he was the main reason the garage didn't burn down.

I've been seeing more "movement out the corner of my eye" this generally signals they are up to something, usually unpleasant. In fact I hesitate to get started on the Christmas projects I have planned, simply because it gives them more ammunition to use against me, more items to go missing or find their way to areas of the farm where they are a hazard or totally inappropriate. For example, the machete I bought for moving around the densely overgrown areas near the springs, is now stuck high on a phone pole that supports the garage roof. No idea how it got there, just way up in the air. Now when do you think that will fall clear of the pole? While I'm outside doing something? Not likely, most probably, when I am next standing under it, and forget it is there. And I have lost, or they have taken, the clip for my 22 rifle. I knew right where it was in the bedroom at the old house, but it somehow became separated in the move and is currently missing. As I mentioned earlier the Garage Gnomes tend to "consort" with the smaller animals, and I've noticed the cat has been pretty jumpy since the latest load of items came down from Akron. I fear that I have spread their infestation to NADA farm... I'll have to work on setting a trap to see if I can capture one and see if it is a city Gnome or a Farm Gnome. Of course first I'll have to figure out how to tell them apart, unless I get one of them I'm familiar with from Akron, and you may remember, they weren't very happy with me the last time we interacted. And unfortunately the Akron Garage Gnomes became familiar with my previous trapping techniques, and were getting really good at avoiding or escaping from them. So I'll have to come up with some new methodologies, and that takes time.

I have been putting together various snares and have noticed a distinct difference in the Southern Garage Gnomes, they are not smarter, but craftier, than the "citified" Gnomes. They seem to use more levering and weight driven devices to create their "constructs", so when things get moving they move a little slower at first but rapidly gain momentum, and really hit with a wallop! Kind of makes me jittery in a way, I'm starting to identify with the barn cat.

There have been no clear sightings of the Garage Gnomes here in the Briar Patch, but I'm pretty sure it's a different clan, I can't seem to get a clear fix on any of them down here, which leads me to believe, the other clan allowed me to contact them in Akron. I think they may have "wanted out" nearly as badly as I did. And I'm wondering, if maybe abandoning them, might be an unwise thing to do? Particularly as I am not in a hurry to sell the Akron property yet.