BB cryptozoologist pal Loren Coleman has posted frequently on Cryptomundo about rare and unusual squirrels. He's also done intriguing research on the weirder side of baseball and the culture surrounding the game. Over at Cryptomundo, Coleman points out that his two interests came together in a New York Times article today about a squirrel running up and down the right field foul pole in Yankee Stadium on Tuesday night. NYT sportswriter Teddy Kider writes that, according to Norse mythology, the squirrel was a bad omen for the New York Yankees. From the New York Times:
Believe it or not, the squirrel’s actions closely resembled those of Ratatosk, or “gnawing tooth,” a squirrel in Norse mythology that climbed up and down a tree that represented the world. Snorri Sturluson, an Icelandic scholar and poet, recorded the story in his 13th-century work “Prose Edda.”
As the story goes, Ratatosk carried insults as it traveled to opposite ends of the tree, fueling a rivalry between the evil dragon residing at the bottom of the tree and the eagle perched at the top…
The Yankees said the squirrel came down about 20 minutes after Tuesday’s game and was allowed to go on its way. It joins a cast of baseball creatures that includes the black cat that crossed in front of the Chicago Cubs’ dugout during their ill-fated pennant-race battle with the Mets in 1969 and the bird that Dave Winfield killed with a throw in Toronto in 1983.
