Words I Never Thought I'd Hear Myself Say in the Same Sentence

"There's a very large, very dead racoon in my swimming pool"

I said those words to our local animal control unit, after Rocky had been marinating in the pool overnight. (Maybe two nights. Not sure I checked the pool the day before.) They said they'd be out to pick him up. They called back a couple minutes later to say they could only pick him up if he was at "the front of the property". They didn't ask if I was 97 years old or in a wheelchair, so I asked them "What part of the property? On the lawn, out in the street, what?"

They were a little vague on that part, so I hunted down my shovel, envisioning balancing a heavy dead raccoon on the end of my shovel for about the length of a football field. Then, I imagined I'd have to stand guard over it, in case the local neighborhood kids, dogs, cats or squirrels decided to get frisky with it. (Actually, I wouldn't have warned off the squirrels!)

Then, it occurred to me that I had an extra recycling bin (long story) that I could wheel to the pool and the front yard without having to worry about other pesky neighborhood critters. I fished him out with a shovel. Unceremoniously dumped him (I'm assuming it's a him. Didn't check personally!) into the recycling bin and rolled him to a shady spot at the end of the driveway for easy drive through service. I thought very briefly about parking him in the sun to give them the full Eau de Dead Racoon je ne sais quoi*, but I figured their job was going to be nasty enough without the extra ambiance.

I assisted the very nice lady from animal control into getting Rocky into a couple of 30 gallon trash bags. I thanked her for her assistance, bade her farewell with the hope that this would be the nastiest thing she'd see all day. Then proceeded to hook up my garden hose, ignoring whatever restrictions there were for using one's hose on a non-accepted day, and hopefully rinsed whatever remained of Rocky's essence or aroma into the gutter, to further enhance the lives of our infamous Delta smelt.

So much for my excitement today! I now officially have four recycling bins: Garbage, Paper and Plastic, Green Waste, and Dead Raccoons.


*BTW, Eau de Dead Racoon je ne sais quoi* are also words I never thought I'd say in the same sentence!