The Wren.

I got home tonight around four, grabbed the dog and went outside, only to find a dead wren on the patio. It's near a window, so I'm sure the poor bird took a fatal header into it, as they are sometimes wont to do.

The dog was very interested in this. He was very disappointed that I did not allow him to snack on our departed friend. The wren stayed where it was while I pondered this (a dead wren on the porch, not letting the dog eat it. Ew.).

The Husband came home, we came outside, and I showed him the poor little bird, already being eaten by ants. "We'll have to put him in the woods," he said. "Um..." I said. The Husband, knowing me rather well by this point, knew where this was going.

"You want to keep the bones, don't you." Notice there is no question mark there.

"I was thinking of sticking the wren on an anthill," I said, and we went inside to gather my things for tonight's riding lesson.

I came back. The wren was still there. I did a few things around the house, got in bed with the Husband for a bit, and then...came out here to put the wren in an opportune place next to the garden.

What really happened looks like some kind of Hogwarts math class:

If a witch (W) wants, after sex with her Husband (Sex and Death, anyone?), to don a bathrobe and head out to the dead wren (DW)with the intent of putting it on an anthill (A) without attracting attention from her housemates (H1,2), which means no flashlight (F), but also doesn't want to get bitten by the ants already consuming DW, how does she do it?

Quickly. And carefully.

W is unbitten, H1 & 2 seem none the wiser, and DW is now in the garden. I talked to it, apologizing for the windows and wishing it a nice sojourn in the Summerlands/a good next incarnation, and explaining what I'd like to do with its bones once they're clean.

So help me, if I see that single row of teethmarks in it tomorrow, I am having a ton of salt delivered to this place. Because it does occur to me that while I've seen bluebirds, woodpeckers, hawks, crows, cardinals, mockingbirds, and sparrows aplenty, I haven't seen or heard a single wren since we moved in.