Sunday, August 06, 2006
Urban wildlife trials
This morning, at 2:30am, I finally got out of bed after laying awake listening to someone(s) having a very loud party on my roof.
It was a constant whack! bam! bump bump rolllllll. Nothing even a deep sleeper like me could sleep through.
So I went outside, thinking it was the family of opposums that live under my house that were on the roof. I have had it with the opposums, they live under my bathtub and inside the house it sounds like they're rearranging furniture down there. I can live with that - but they breed fleas better than a lab could. Each time I take a shower there are tens of fleas in the tub. I have a spray to kill them that lasts a few weeks, and there is always a serious flea mortuary under the bathroom trash can. Unfortunately Carrie the Cat is highly allergic to their bites and she's driven insane by just the one bite that the fleas can get in before her Frontline flea killer kicks in. Carrie recently had a cortisone shot for the itching but it's already back again. So, the opposums must move on. (By the way - have you SEEN their feet? Sheesh. I don't mind the rat tails and I think their faces are cute, but their feet - eek!)
So outside, I can see that someone is in the walnut tree over the roof and shaking the heck out of it. Bam Bam! Walnuts fall and roll down the roof. Soon I realize that there are two gleaming eyes and the nose of a racoon staring down at me from the roof - the culprit!
Not my photo but that same innocent look!
I ask him what the heck he thinks he's doing but he just goes back up the roof and starts jumping at the tree again. I watched for a while. He would make the walnuts fall and when they rolled down the roof, he would go to the edge to look down to see where they went. Then back up for more. It was a game - knock them off, watch them roll. Imaginary raccoon giggle. So I threw walnuts at him. He came over to look at me again - 5 feet from my face - his little nose and eyes just looked at me. I told him that he was driving me crazy! He just went back for more walnuts. I threw more nuts. Eventually he "ran away" - if you can call it "running away." He jumped onto the fence and walked along the top of it straight toward me and on past... Sheesh. He has also been vandalizing my pond!
It was a constant whack! bam! bump bump rolllllll. Nothing even a deep sleeper like me could sleep through.
So I went outside, thinking it was the family of opposums that live under my house that were on the roof. I have had it with the opposums, they live under my bathtub and inside the house it sounds like they're rearranging furniture down there. I can live with that - but they breed fleas better than a lab could. Each time I take a shower there are tens of fleas in the tub. I have a spray to kill them that lasts a few weeks, and there is always a serious flea mortuary under the bathroom trash can. Unfortunately Carrie the Cat is highly allergic to their bites and she's driven insane by just the one bite that the fleas can get in before her Frontline flea killer kicks in. Carrie recently had a cortisone shot for the itching but it's already back again. So, the opposums must move on. (By the way - have you SEEN their feet? Sheesh. I don't mind the rat tails and I think their faces are cute, but their feet - eek!)
So outside, I can see that someone is in the walnut tree over the roof and shaking the heck out of it. Bam Bam! Walnuts fall and roll down the roof. Soon I realize that there are two gleaming eyes and the nose of a racoon staring down at me from the roof - the culprit!
Not my photo but that same innocent look!
I ask him what the heck he thinks he's doing but he just goes back up the roof and starts jumping at the tree again. I watched for a while. He would make the walnuts fall and when they rolled down the roof, he would go to the edge to look down to see where they went. Then back up for more. It was a game - knock them off, watch them roll. Imaginary raccoon giggle. So I threw walnuts at him. He came over to look at me again - 5 feet from my face - his little nose and eyes just looked at me. I told him that he was driving me crazy! He just went back for more walnuts. I threw more nuts. Eventually he "ran away" - if you can call it "running away." He jumped onto the fence and walked along the top of it straight toward me and on past... Sheesh. He has also been vandalizing my pond!
