Be vewwy, vewwy quiet! I'm huntin' wabbits!

That was tonight's adventure. I went outside and saw my next-door neighbors across the street. I asked what was going on, and they said they'd seen a rabbit. It was in the bushes in crazy-lawn-lady's yard. (A quick recap for those of you who missed it: my across-the-street neighbor is obsessed with her lawn. It looks like a putting green. She waters every day and I have seen her on her hands and knees trimming it.) Anyway, Zadie and I went over mainly so we could see the rabbit. But soon we were involved in neighbor Ed Begley's dilemna -- what do you do?

It wasn't a wild rabbit. It was clearly domesticated. So do you catch it? And if you catch it, what do you do with it? I offered a cat carrier, but you can't just leave it in one. The neighbors suggested their backyard, but thought it might eat their garden. I thought of my backyard, but it would be easy to escape from. Their house, with a mean cat, was out. My house, with a cat and a baby, was also out. Animal control was out, since it probably meant certain death for the rabbit. Their garage was a possibility. I thought of putting up flyers, but finding a flyer that said "Hey, we saw your bunny a couple days ago in this area" probably isn't that useful. If you catch it and hold it, do you wait for someone to see flyers or try to find it a new home? Is there a Sacramento House Rabbit society? We decided to catch it, put it in the neighbors' garage, and put up flyers.

But catching it proved difficult. It allowed itself to be caught once by Ed Begley's wife, but it squirmed and kicked out of her grasp. We chased it through three yards, occasionally diving and falling to the ground in an attempt to grab it. It went under a car, and when we chased it out, it went under another car. We spent about half an hour between planning and running, and finally it ran under a fence into another neighbor's backyard. They knocked on the neighbor's door to see if she could help, but started with "You don't happen to have a rabbit, do you?" As it turned out it WAS her rabbit, so it was safely home.

Anyway, Zadie said "hop hop" and showed Ed Begley all her dance moves, and I got to walk on the sacred lawn! I walked across it a couple times for good measure. Ed Begley's wife pointed out that I was leaving footprints, so I made sure to walk off the lawn in the direction of their house.