A Visit From the Critterman

Last night the cats started acting weirder than usual. At first they were just tearing around the house with too much energy, racing each other (mom included) across the living room, sliding on the coffee table, over the couch, onto the recliner by way of the TV tray, into the kitchen and onto the window sill (or all the way up to the curtain rods). And then back again.

Suddenly, it became very still and quiet. When I looked around from where I was doing dishes I saw the kids trying to climb the front of the bookcase and mama all the way up on top, over six feet up where she had never gone before, and threatening one of Mom's ceramics. She backed as far away from the edge as she could and, although I could just reach her, I couldn't get the leverage to haul her down. There was a dull, rhythmic thumping behind her which I assumed was her tail against the wall.

I called my brother, who is taller, to help and when he came out of his room, which shares that wall, he took one look at Jasmine and said, "So that's what all the noise is about." He was wrong.

After we hauled the cat down, the noise continued. Jasmine, incensed at being forcibly removed from her discovery leapt from a side table to a small but slightly taller curio stand (knocking over a vaguely disturbing articulated painted wooden wizard/clown "doll" of unknown provenance) to the top of the old TV onto the bookcase, thus explaining how she got there the first time. Something was in the wall and she had dibs.

My brother, after yelling at all the cats sufficiently to keep them off the bookcase, spent the night listening to whatever it was skittering around.

First thing this morning he called an animal removal guy who came out, crawled into our attic and removed a smallish 'possum that had fallen inside the wall and couldn't climb out on its own. He also found and blocked up the hole that had allowed the 'possum to get into the attic in the first place although he warned that his fix will not prevent raccoons from gaining entry if they want because they have those nimble, tricksy fingers and can literally pull the patch apart.

The 'possum is now on its way to the local (semi-)wilderness where it will be set free to live happily away from people and near to the pythons and panthers and black bears and alligators and tegus and whatever else is hiding out there.

Good luck, little fella!

The Wild Life

We live in a stereotypical suburban development.

Earlier this winter, my brother heard loud noises in the ceiling crawl space. After some fumbling around with ladders and flashlights we determined that a raccoon had taken possession of the attic. My brother chased it out and found a loose board under an eave above a projection that allowed the beastie to climb up and in. He reattached it and the attic has remained vacant.

In January, something ate through the connecting hose between the dishwasher and the sink drain. My brother replaced the hose and set a mousetrap under the sink. When that was tripped to no effect, he went out and bought a much larger rat trap but the rat was way too smart for that. It did make the mistake of coming out while I was up, though. It was huge, fat, sleek and beautiful. I chased it along the edge of the living room and behind the bookcase. When it came out the other side I was afraid it was going for my brother's room but it took a left into the laundry room instead. I blocked off the space under the laundry room door and chased it into the garage (which door has a step and therefor no clearance allowing re-entry). It hasn't returned that I know of but it was fastidiously clean and (unlike a mouse) left no indication of it's presence anywhere visible.

A few nights ago, as I was sitting in the living room, I noticed a little face pushed up against the glass door to the lanai (the wall between the living room and lanai consists of three floor-to-ceiling glass panels one of which slides open). It was an opossum. I went to the door and waved at it to no effect. So I took the Hammacher Schlemmer catalog (which has multiple offerings of expensive high tech toys and cleaning robots and shoes and slippers for sufferers of plantars fascitis (hey, it's their demographic) but not one thing (I checked) for removing 'possums from your back porch) and slapped the glass with it. It moved to look around the catalog. So I turned on the lanai light. It blinked, assumed it was now daylight, and slowly walked back to the hot tub where there is apparently a hole in the screen big enough for a 'possum to get through.

Yesterday, as my brother was carrying groceries in from his truck, he had to stop at the front door to say hello to a rabbit that was hanging out with one of the gnomes. Last night the opossum was back in the lanai peering into the living room again.

We live in a stereotypical suburban development. Really.