I was slow getting out there to pick up the hazelnuts that the wind knocked down. The rain might have had something to do with my laziness.

“Anyway,” I reasoned, “the first ones to fall are the bad ones or the empty shells. I’ll wait a day or two.”

MISTAKE!!

A thief in the night cleaned me out.

Today, in broad daylight, my suspicions were confirmed.

“LINCOLN THE DELINQUENT WAS BACK!”

See how sneakily he hustled to hide behind the nut tree when he heard the click of my camera?

But after a while, he felt safe enough to come out into the open and brazenly eat one of the hundreds of hazelnuts he had stolen.

Another click of my faraway camera and he scurried over to hide behind a low-hanging branch of the hazelnut tree.

“She can’t see me here,” he said to himself. “She’ll never guess how many I already have tucked away. Hee hee. But to show some goodwill, I left her a bunch.”

 

“I know, Lincoln. Thanks for nothing. Those were all the rotten ones!”