Plan 10 From Inner House
The Ballad of Sploot.
“There’s a thing living in the walls.”
In October 2020, I typed this sentence in an email to the coordinator for an online reading of Plan 9 From Outer Space. I was excited to be asked again to participate in another Plan 9 event. Yes, that’s a thing that happens and yes, I’d previously been in two live performances of Plan 9. The casts were amazing. In 2017: Dana Gould, Michael Ian Black, Janet Varney, Ron Lynch, Scott Adsit, Gilbert Gottfried, John Hodgman, Mark Gagliardi, Adam Savage and Ennis Esmer. In 2019: Dana Gould, Jackie Harris-Greenberg, Jonah Ray, Jeffrey Combs, John Hodgman, Dave Foley, Scott Adsit, Paul Greenberg, Bobcat Goldthwait and Frank Conniff. Very, very cool. I had a blast both times.
However, I could not participate in the lockdown, online version of Plan 9. I had to cancel embarrassingly at the last minute because my household had to hire people to take some of the house apart to find “the thing living in the walls.” Typing these sentences in a work email felt a lot like saying, “the dog ate my homework and then climbed into the garbage disposal, so I hope you understand that I cannot be there.” It felt crazy. A wild made-up excuse. I hesitated to send this message, thinking “They’re never going to invite me back because I sound fucking bonkers.” Well, they were very nice in their responses and wished me luck with my situation, but I never did get invited back.
I’m not gonna assume that my missing invitations were because of my, “thing living in the walls, rip house up, noises are terrible” statements. I’m not going to assume that, but if you asked me quietly, I'd whisper, “it was totally that.” Maybe they haven’t held new Plan 9 performances since - oh they have. I just googled and they have. I’ve never brought this up to Hodgman, who recommended me for the events. John, I hope you’re reading this right now and I’m so sorry if Dana or anyone else ever asked, “What was up with that crazy person you said was gonna be great?” I promise you, John, There was a thing. It was in the walls.
The “thing” turned out to be a squirrel. Multiple squirrels, who sounded like they were having gladiator matches in the walls and under the flooring. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard squirrels fight, but it’s not a nice sound. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard squirrels scrambling through the walls of your house, or apartment, but non-surprise - also not a nice sound. It was so loud and I knew it would have been audible in an online performance.
“Why does she have demons screeching every time she unmutes,” was not the question I could have everyone asking. “Is that a circular saw?” Mmmmhmm. That was also not the stellar thespian moment I'd wished to deliver via the interwebs. In 2020, I'd made the decision to cancel. In 2024, I would attend with fucking bells on, thus making the performance even more distracting. 2024 Jean would take all the sound compression fixes OFF my Zoom and roll loudly with both the squirrel fisticuffs, and power tools as ambience with absolutely no explanation. The years have changed me. Rock the bells. That's a great reference.
It took a couple of weeks, but the squirrels were trapped humanely, removed from the house, and released. Our squirrel guy, Tim, was really lovely and I could tell he cared about the lil squirrels. Which was great, because I too, care deeply for animals and don’t want them harmed. I also, do not want them in the walls of a house I’m living in. Squirrels can wreak absolute havoc inside the walls of a home. Structural damage, electrical damage. Even if they’re not having gladiator fights and terrifyingly scratching through the innards of your abode, you gotta get the squirrels out of there. They will chew up every damn thing.
I did a lot of squirrel research during this time. I didn’t have time to do squirrel research, we had just moved twice in the pandemic and I was desperately trying to order furniture and produce my puppet show. Listen, I’m not gonna spoil a lot of my book for you. You can read more about that (mis)adventure when it drops. The last thing I wanted, was to have another nightmare literally “coming from inside the house,” and then to have to research “how to make in-house nightmare stop.” But, oh well. I know a lot about squirrels now.
This is why in September of this year, I saw a squirrel splooting on our neighbor's deck and thought, oh no. He looks really comfortable. He better fucking not.
“You better fucking not!” I stood on our back deck and pointed my finger at the squirrel, who maintained eye contact with me as I spoke. “You better not even think about coming in here. You’re very cute, but you cannot come in here.” He was smirking at me. “And don’t smirk, Sploot!” Oh crap, I’d named him so fast. Now I'd bonded with him in my mind. “Sploot! Do not come in here!” As I went back inside, I knew that it would only be a matter of time. Sploot was gonna try to get in these walls - omg that sounded weird. In the house. The house walls.
As Littles sat by the window, he and Sploot staring at each other lovingly, I sighed. Sploot looked at me through the dead ivy he was nestled in. “Don’t do it, man,” I said softly. Sploot laughed in my face and ran up the side of the house, out of sight. Littles turned to look at me and I know he said, “That’s my friend.” I sighed and alerted the household that we were about to have squirrels in the walls again and that we should call Tim. I tried to be pro-active. I tried. A few days later, after a few more “through the prison glass” encounters between Littles and Sploot, the in-wall scrambling began.
Sploot is an adventurer. An explorer. He’s sassy and territorial. He likes to maintain eye contact and does respond to that “come hither” wavy thing you can do with your arm to make squirrels come on up and say hi. At this point, my squirrel knowledge has surpassed simple research. I blame TikTok Derrick Downey Jr. And Maxine the squirrel.
https://www.amazon.com/Hand-Paw-Maxines-Tale-Compassion/dp/B0CR6YF9Y9
I’ve thought many times about having a Maxine-esque relationship with Sploot. But he does not live in the trees nearby. He cannot live within the walls of the house. And we cannot bring him inside to live with us. We gotta get Sploot the fuck up out of the walls.
“Hey, we have to get Sploot the fuck up out of the walls.”
I have said every day, many times a day since September. I have stressed that it is urgent. For Sploot, for the structural integrity of the house, and Littles sanity. Littles has designated himself: Sploot hunter and protector of all those who reside on the real inner walls. Littles is very anxious, and if Sploot were actually in the room with him, he would freeze right up. He does not hunt things. He points them out and makes friends. He’s a lover, not a fighter, and has been spending long hours as a pretend security guard of sorts. I do not want him to do this. He does not want to do this, but is compelled by his - being a cat.
Sploot is in the house really deep. I know this, because I saw leaves on the bedroom floor and couldn’t figure out where they were coming from. It took a second to realize that they were coming from the ceiling vent. I guess he’s building stuff in there. I also know this, because his scramblin’ path all around the house is vast and loud. It is unsettling, to say the least. It triggers the same feeling as hearing those tiny footsteps running around in that Twilight Zone episode (The Dummy) with that goddamned ventriloquist dummy. Littles and I stare at each other, get up, and follow the sounds. Every day. All day. We are tired. Finally, Tim has been called. It’s been three months since Sploot started living in the walls. Every day, I wonder how bad it’s gonna get. That question was answered yesterday.
“Hi -property manager name - so….the left side of the house/gutter/roof just fell off. There’s a big hole in the house and you can see a huge squirrel nest. I’m guessing this happened for a few reasons but mainly the squirrels I’ve been telling everyone about for months. It’s raining very hard so these are the best pictures I could get - again, there’s a twenty-foot hole in the house. The house is… open. The gutter is dangling. Help.”
This all happened right after Tim came out to assess the Sploot situation. I was working in the living room and heard a loud bang, thinking perhaps we had caught Sploot, but he had a gun to shoot himself out of the trap. No. It was the house. It was the house that fell off the house. Exposing the giant squirrel nest. In a bomb cyclone, all of this happened.
As I laughed manically out of desperation and came back inside to put on dry clothes, I heard a scurrying through the walls. Littles looked at me and sighed. I sighed. I thought about posting “sorry I couldn’t make it on time for my Thursday Substack, there’s a Sploot in the walls and the house fell off” to you guys, but that’s something 2020 Jean would have done. 2024 Jean is here with bells on for the community and my compression of misadventures all the way off. I do have to leave the story as to be continued though, Tim is on his way back right now and there’s still a giant hole in the side of the house AND a dangling gutter.
I don’t know what the plan is to fix all of this (apparently no one in charge who should be professionally fixing this emergency situation knows either) but I think we should label it as Plan 10 and see our way through it. I can’t wait to update you next week, and I’m so glad that in this ADVENTURES section, I included the fact that it would be both international and domestic gallivanting. I only hadn't considered that I would be still, and Sploot would be the one on the journey.
*I’ll drop a NON Sploot “How to pack efficiently with fashionable luggage in case of potentially getting denaturalized and deported: for people like me” piece mid week.
Omg I came to read this as instructed and I am gobsmacked. 😶