There are many symptoms that manifest in those people that work from home too much.

Some people stay up to late at night and sleep late in the morning. Almost everyone dresses more casually, unless they have a business meeting to attend. Many people lose weight and start exercising more regularly.

Some workers get more done and some slack off. Its been my experience that this symptom manifests in a 50/50 sort of way and can not be guessed at based on any previous displays of hard work, efficiency or even laziness and ineptitude. People working from home go through phases just like everyone else.

Regardless, there is one symptom that manifests in people that work from home in one form or another after enough time has passed. Eventually, they will start looking outside and sometimes even they will watch the plants and animals outside.

Some people living in a city may watch the dogs at the park or the pigeons on the sidewalk. People living on a lake may watch the fish or the ducks or other birds. Birds are also popular with anyone that has a bird feeder well positioned outside their window or deck.

For me, its squirrels. I'm not fascinated by squirrels. I don't harbor any affection nor disaffection towards squirrels. My yard just has a lot of squirrels. I never realized I had developed a squirrel watching symptom manifesting until I had a squirrelly incident occur last week.

Before I describe the incident let me offer up the disclaimer I have watched out for squirrels to protect my home. They have tunnelled into my chimney following wood pecker and holes through the cypress siding. They have chewed their way through my plastic gutter guards, installed to keep my gutters clear of pine needles, which I harvest for mulch in my back yard.

They gnaw on my siding occassionally and make a lot of squirrely barking racket chasing each other around my roof. A month ago, they even chewed a hole through my plastic garbage can lid. They didn't eat any trash or break a trash bag, just wanted to chew up my can.

Last week, I saw the stranges squirrel behavior that I've witnessed to date and its also the point at which I became aware that I am watching the squirrels. I was sitting on my front deck typing away on my computer. I heard some animal panting and some skurrying in a large 60 foot tall pine tree located in front of my house.

It sounded like a squirrel, but not like a normal squirrel. I looked up and saw something strange. I saw a squirrel with a squirrel tail coming out of both ends.

The squirrel had a normal squirrel tail, and it had a full squirrel tail coming out of its mouth. Now I've never heard of squirrel canabalism and I've never heard of a half breed squirrel snake, swallowing other squirrels whole like a Boa Constrictor swallowing a pig or something.

I quick ran and grabbed my camera and watched this squirrel, panting and crawling down the side of the tree.

My deck is about 10 feet off the ground and as the squirrel got to my eye level I realized that the tail wasn't coming out of the squirrels mouth, but was wrapped over the squirrels mouth just a bit and that the squirrel did have a squirrel leg in its mouth.

To be more precise it was probably a squirrel thigh. Now I've eaten squirrely thighs myself, deep fried with batter and they aren't very large, but I'm not a squirrel and I've got a bigger mouth than a squirrel. This squirrel could barely fit the thigh in its mouth.

I started taking pictures as it continued down the tree. I soon realized that the squirrel thigh was attached to a squirrel but complete with the tail that had previously made for a strange vision. This squirrel but was in fact attached to a complete squirrel.

The original squirrel I was looking at was carrying another squirrel with its mouth by the thigh down the tree. Both squirrel's appeared to be full grown. I watched the squirrel get to the base of the tree, jump to the ground, and then still carrying the second squirrel, proceed to climb up a maple tree in my front yard, back up 30 feet in the air panting louder and heavier the whole way. In fact I could now see that the laboring squirrel's chest was heaving visably.

At that point the squirrel with the second squirrel in its mouth, jumped from the tree and landed on the chimney of my roof carrying the other squirrel.

I haven't seen any squirrel carryings since then, but that was definitely bizarre and now I know my symptoms have manifested.

Step 1.
Hello, my nane is Brett Harold (Harry) Bumeter and I work from a home office.
Step 2.
I sometimes watch squirrels.
Step 3.
Hell if I know I haven't really found a 12 step program for squirrel watchers anonymous . . .