BURGLERY

There was a loud crash that came from the kitchen, waking me up around 3:30 Wednesday morning. At first I thought that Albus might be chasing a mouse or something around the dining room, but then the noises started to sound like someone rooting around in our kitchen drawers. I laid there imagining some person rummaging through our things. I peeled myself out of bed and put on a robe. Then I looked around my dark room for some sort of weapon. I grabbed a yoga bolster, opened my bedroom door, and quietly stepped out into the hallway, prepared for a pillow fight. I poked my head around the corner and made eye contact with a raccoon. The raccoon then scurried from the dinning room and into the kitchen.

I jumped back, my heart beating in my chest and whispered “I can’t do this alone.” So, I did the thing I loathe doing and went and woke Michael up. I said “Hey, I’m really sorry to do this, but there are raccoons in our kitchen and I can’t do this alone.” I don’t know what part of my sentence made Michael suddenly very alert, but he sat up and looked at me with wide open eyes and loudly whispered “There are raccoons in the kitchen?!” I nodded, still clutching my yoga bolster and said “there are raccoons in the kitchen.” By the time we made it back to the kitchen, the raccoons, two of them, had scurried out into the garage where they tried to hide in plain site. We sealed off all of the pet doors and then he proceeded to convince the raccoons to exit the garage while I started cleaning up the mess they left behind inside.

It could have been worse.

They ate the cat food that was still in the cat’s bowl and they pulled pizza out of the trash bin. They had dragged the open bag of cat food into the center of the kitchen but had yet to dump the contents out on the floor. The biggest mess was left in the dog bowl and water dish. Michael had a small planter sitting on the window ledge where he has been trying to grow a banzai tree for the last three years. The small little tree had finally reached a size where it not only had leaves, but it could be shaped. Michael had fixed a paperclip to the stem to encourage it to grow with a bend. The raccoons had knocked over the whole thing, dumping dirt and tree into the water dish and food bowl. I rescued the tree from the water dish and we set it aside so Michael can re-pot it.

As I was washing out the water dish, Micheal came back inside from clearing the raccoons out of the garage. He pouted as he delicately lifted his tree and said “I think one of the took a bite out it.” Then he looked at me and we just sort of stared at each other for a minute. He said “we had raccoons in our kitchen.” I nodded and replied “we had raccoons in our kitchen.” Then we went back to bed, except I laid there staring up at my ceiling and listening. At one point, I was sure they had come back and I got up and did a perimeter check. All of the pet doors were secure, nothing in the basement. I peeked out the front door and watched as one ran down the sidewalk. I narrowed my eyes at the creature and then I went back to bed.

Later, at a more reasonable hour, Michael was getting ready to leave for work. He paused outside of our bathroom where I stood applying face cream. He said “Thank you for asking for help earlier.” This is one of our biggest topics of disagreements. I do not ask for help. Even if it is clear to everyone around me that I need help, I will not ask for help. I will be dragging all of the groceries up the hill to the front door as Michael is on his way out to help me. He will ask “Need help?” and I always respond “No. I got it.” I can spend twenty minutes trying to open a jar, determined to not hand it over to larger hands. “Do you need help?” he’ll ask and me grunting with the brute force I am applying to the lid will mumble “No.” It drives Michael insane.

I believe we both have learned my limits. It’s raccoons. My limit is raccoons in my kitchen.

THE ANIMALS ARE WINNING

White cat/black dog

"White cat/black dog"

Josephine is ornery. I mean, not all the time, but I spent most of Sunday picking up pieces of shredded Kleenex, moping up leftover tomato soup and explaining how we do not pull garbage out of the trash can. I know she ate at least half of a bagel because she came in with the other half, hunting around for a hiding place. She has discovered that she is just tall enough to pull trash out of a full trash can. She spent diligent time practicing this skill even after Michael chased her with the trash can while banging it around with the hopes of making the trash can into the scariest thing. Now, the trash can is a little scary, but not scary enough for her to keep her from stealing delicious treats off the top. When she wasn't stealing garbage, she was in the backyard shredding the seat off of one of chairs in the backyard or trying to drag the cat around by his hind leg. I don't know what her deal was, but she had a definite bee up her butt. 

In about three weeks, Josephine will be one years old. She is still very much a puppy. I have taught her sit, down and off and for the most part, she's pretty good with those things. Coming when she's called works most of the time unless she has something in her mouth she knows she's not supposed to have. Yesterday, that object happened to be one of my slippers. We did a hostage style trade with her toy turtle. At least he squeaks; the slipper is just soft. She's not a bad dog. I'm making it sound like she's a holy terror. Most of the time she just wants to chew on a toy while you pet her. Lately she's been waking me up around 4 AM to go outside and when she comes back in I just let her stay out of the crate. She curls herself into a ball at the foot of the bed and keeps my feet warm. She is a lovable crazy hot mess of a dog. 

One of my goals for the new year is to spend some time doing some serious obedience training with her. I have the know how. It's just been a hundred years since I've had to use that know how. In the meantime, we will be investing in a new trash can with a lid and maybe some puzzle treat toys. Now if I could only train the cat. This morning I walked into the kitchen to find worm parts and guts smeared all over the kitchen floor. This evening I came home to a cat who looked like he had rolled around in a mud puddle. I'm not sure what to do about that since Michael and I value our skin too much to attempt bathing him.