night time intruders...

Two nights ago I was closing up the main floor windows and shutting the blinds before I went to bed. As I was closing the last one (the kitchen window, which is facing our backyard) I heard some movement that was definitely coming from our yard. Thinking it was someone from next door (the blue house) I switched on the light on the outside of our garage and flung open the blind covering our back door window. This is what I saw:


That would have been bad enough, but then I realized that I had more of a problem on my hands than I realized!



We had caught a squirrel in our newly acquired live trap and had put it out of it's misery (thanks Mike!), but hadn't disposed of it yet (it was 10:30pm by the time we got around to "putting it down"). Well, this family of raccoons were more than happy to help me with the problem of disposing of the squirrel's remains--the only problem for them was the trap! When I went out to scare them away and assure them that I would take care of the squirrel myself, they didn't seem to believe me and challenged me! (what nerve!) There were 6 raccoons in all--I'm guessing it was a mother and 5 babies. The mother got a bit protective when I came out there and she tried to scare me. I, however, was armed with a broom and plastic garbage can lid (they weren't too impressed!). They soon found out just how serious (and stubborn) I was and decided it wasn't worth the fight. They did, however, all watch me from the top of the fence nearby while I rescued my squirrel remains (and trap) and then "hurried" back inside. It was quite exciting!