It was the end of the day and things seemed to be settling down. The pork chops that had been cooking all afternoon in the crock pot were done and smelled delicious and I had just put some potatoes in the microwave. The kids were enjoying the cool air and were sitting by the air conditioner reading the new books we had gotten from our library visit earlier in the day. Then the power went out. My potatoes were no longer cooking and we no longer had air conditioning. I tried not to grumble reminding myself that if we could survive without power for two days and two nights during an ice storm we could survive the inconvenience of uncooked potatoes and no air conditioning. I started opening windows hoping to get some air from the breeze outside when I noticed that I could still hear my neighbors fans running. After checking with neighbors on either side of us (who still had power) I was very perplexed. Of course this all happened after the office was closed so it takes longer to get maintenance to respond. I left my message and then waited to hear back.
In the meantime some of the kids decided to go sit on the back porch since they couldn't sit in front of the fans anymore. Next thing I knew Natalie shouted, "Mom, there's a racoon!" I thought she was joking and questioned her but all the kids were telling me there was a racoon behind our rose bush. If the kids had reached out their hands they could have touched it and I quickly told them to run to the other side of the grass to get them away from the raccoon. I called Jeremiah and his reaction was the same as mine when the kids first told me about the raccoon. The kids were still outside and I couldn't get them in the back door since the scary creature was right on our porch! I was still on the phone with Jeremiah and the kids were giving me a play by play update of the raccoon.
"Mom! It's right under the back door!" "Mom, it's going in the garden!" "Mom! it's climbing up the bricks outside the door." "Mom, it's climbing on the door!"
Sure enough the raccoon had climbed up the screen door and was looking me in the eyes. I was so stunned that I just stood there staring at it instead of grabbing the camera and Jeremiah had to tell me to have the kids run around to the front door so I could get them in the house. DUH!!!!!! I felt pretty stupid for not thinking of that one. I was basically in a bit of a panic because there was a rabid raccoon outside my door, my kids were outside, and I couldn't get them back inside!
Animal control had left for the day and by the time the police responded to our call the animal was nowhere to be seen. Hope they catch that nasty creature before it attacks somebody!
After getting the kids back inside I talked with them about the importance of staying away from wild animals especially ones that are nocturnal and out in broad daylight. Trevor took it all in and I thought I was doing a good job of explaining about sick animals biting and making us sick when Trevor turned to me and said, "So if a raccoon bites me I could turn into a sick raccoon?" I tried not to laugh and made a mental note that maybe he was too young to be listening to me read Harry Potter to Natalie and was quick to assure him that he would not turn into a sick raccoon but would need shots to make him better.
So within an hours time our power outage was resolved and our nasty visitor had left. I did get a picture of it but you will have to click on it to see it better. I didn't dare get very close it definitely looked very sick!
