apparantly belgium has squirrels. apparantly these belgian squirrels are big. big and red. and fluffy. as squirrels should be. as i've always imagined squirrels to be. and just how i want squirrels to be. apparantly they run about, up and down trees, collecting nuts, making squirrel-type noises, and just generally being squirrelish.

now i've known about these so-called facts for some time. i've known that if i leave the cobbled streets behind and head to the outskirts - no further than the outskirts of leuven in fact - that squirrels will appear. and they will appear in big and red and fluffy forms. i know this.

and so saturday was 'the day to find a squirrel'. of course this required me leaving those cobbled streets of leuven behind. and finding some trees. because, as far as i'm aware, squirrels like trees. and so that seemed like the logical step to take. in my mind, this is how it should work:

bex + camera + multiple trees (preferably with some sort of nut attached) - cobbled streets = big and red and fluffy squirrels.

and so off i went, camera in hand. and i found the trees, equipped with some nut variation, and i departed from the streets of leuven...

squirrels? no. none. not one. horses? yes. dogs? yes. birds? yes. water buffalo? yes... okay, well they looked like water buffalo but actually ended up being some large 'water buffalo look alike' rocks. but squirrels? no.

in retrospect i am wondering exactly what went wrong. i'm not that much of a squirrel expert. so i cannot come up with any definite solution. though, it has just occured to me, that despite entering a forest, the tracks were all like miniature cobbled streets... perhaps my fundamental 'seeing a squirrel' equation was foiled as i didn't specify that cobbled paths in forests are different from cobbled paths in town. hmmm.

however i will not give up. i will succeed. the squirrel will not pull wool over my eyes and lead me astray. the squirrel will be found. and i shall reign triumphant. (and this is sounding like one of those speeches the president gives in the movies before they attack the aliens...)