Remember when I told you I thought Yeti was killing animals in the 'hood?

Before I tell you all about the latest installment of "Yeti is crazy in the 'hood", I want to preface this blog post by saying that I come from a long line of animal lovers and what I'm about to tell you was very hard for me to witness and I was quite upset about it. And once again, I could not make this shit up if I tried.

A couple weeks ago, I took a vacation day to go Christmas shopping. I put the offspring on the bus and when I came back inside, Dave was in the kitchen getting ready to leave for work. "Tracey, look in the back yard," he said. I figured there was a deer in the back yard because Barb had recently captured several of Santa's finest enjoying our tranquil slice of urban sprawl. But it wasn't a deer, it was a raccoon. Probably you're not supposed to approach undomesticated animals but it was just sitting there and it didn't move when I opened the sliding glass door so I decided to take the camera and investigate further. I got all the way down to the middle of the yard and the raccoon still hadn't moved. I was able to walk right up to it (while Dave watched from the safety of our deck shouting helpful things like, "Be careful!" and "What's wrong with it?").


I looked closely at the raccoon because I thought it was dead.



But then it raised it's little head and looked at me with sad eyes. "Hi lady. I don't feel very good. Can you please help me"?

I guess I got sort of attached but I couldn't help it. I named him Curtis.

At this moment I imagined welcoming another pet into our household. Surely Chloe could learn to share her toys with Curtis, right?

But I knew something was terribly wrong with Curtis and I wasn't sure how to fix it.

As I walked away from Curtis I looked back over my shoulder to make sure he wasn't about to launch himself at the back of my neck. Dave thought that was hysterical and I thought to myself, laugh all you want dude, the number of designer handbags I will guilt you into buying me will be in direct proportion to the number of rabies shots I am forced to endure.

Dave had to leave for work so my first problem was figuring out what to do about the sick raccoon in my back yard. But before I can tell you what happened next, I have to tell you what happened last summer. You can read the original post here but if you don't feel like doing that, I will give you the run down.

My neighbor Jody, who lived on the other side of Yeti (they have since moved and the house is currently vacant which means Yeti is letting her dog poop all over the yard until the new owners move in) had a dead raccoon under her tree. And Jody, Vodka Lemonade, and I started getting suspicious because we had heard from Barb a reliable source that Yeti liked to sprinkle some sort of repellent all over her yard lest anyone (adult, child, or animal) get a big idea about stepping onto her grass. So we wondered if what Yeti was sprinkling might be toxic. I didn't think Yeti would be stupid enough to use poison but her psychotic need to keep people out of her yard might have outweighed her ability to use good judgment. I think I have provided numerous examples on this blog of how totally unglued she gets if anyone steps a foot in her yard or driveway. We made a few calls and no one seemed to be able to point us in the right direction for assistance regarding on purpose accidental animal poisoning. I always felt kind of bad about not pursuing it further because there are lots of children and pets in the 'hood and I wouldn't want anything to happen to them if they came into contact with poison. My childhood dog Scooter died because he got into some poison somewhere in the neighborhood I lived in when I was younger and trust me, it's a violent way to die.

So now there was another raccoon and I needed to figure out what to do. First I called my vet's office and while they were very helpful and sympathetic, they were infinitely more practical than me regarding the circle of life and the preservation of urban sprawl wildlife. I decided to call my police department's non-emergency number. Surely they would know what to do.

They told me they would send an officer to check out the situation and when he arrived, I explained about the raccoon in the backyard and told him it was the second raccoon that was either sick or dying. I told him we weren't sure if the neighbor was using repellent that was safe and I asked him if it was okay to use anything toxic on your yard to keep animals away and he said no. Yeti believes she has some sort of mole problem and I wouldn't be surprised if she'd just decided to put something on her lawn that would kill everything. Plus, why the hell does she make her dog Cody lay on a blanket unless there's something poison-y on her grass?

Anyway, the officer turned to me and said he would first go check on the raccoon and then he would go to Yeti's house and speak to her about whatever she was using on her lawn. Then he said, "If the raccoon is dying, I'm going to shoot it with my gun."

Um, what? This was not going the way I thought it might at all. Which is why I burst into tears. I couldn't help it because I was in the midst of a complete and total hormonal shitstorm had a teeny tiny bit of PMS going on and I just lost it. I'm pretty sure the officer made a note in his report about calling Housewife Protective Services because I could not get ahold of myself.

The officer went outside and I called Barb immediately. I also plugged my other ear because I knew Curtis wasn't going to be joining our household and I didn't want to hear the gunshot. I heard it anyway.

Luckily, Barb realized I was emotional and hormonal so she talked me down from the ledge. And now we were both really curious about what the hell Yeti was sprinkling on her grass.

Me: Do you think they can do an autopsy or tox screen or something to determine the cause of death?

Barb: Um, the cause of death is a gunshot wound.

Me: Oh yeah. But I meant, like, can they tell whether or not it has poison in its system?

Barb: I don't think so.

I am not usually so daft. Really.

We have so totally ratcheted up a few spots on the white trash o'meter because now the police aren't just visiting, they are actually firing their weapons. And it's a sad state of affairs when you have to call no fewer than four neighbors to ask if they heard a gunshot and to explain the presence of the police car at the end of your driveway. Again.

When the officer was done shooting and disposing of Curtis, he walked over to Yeti's house. Yeti and Smokey were both home yet they wouldn't answer the door. At least when the police come to our house we always answer.

I called Barb back and while we were further discussing the whole raccoon debacle, she asked me "Hey, where did your flags go?"

Matthew had gathered up 20 or 30 flags left over from last summer's boundary line pissing match and he asked Dave if he could make them into a flag bouquet to stick in our landscaping. Dave said sure, go ahead. So we had a cluster of bright orange flags next to one of the big rocks near the back of the yard. Except now they were missing.

Barb wanted me to tell the officer about the flags but he was already gone and I wanted to check with Dave and Matthew first to see if they had thrown them in the garage or something.

But here's where it gets weird weirder. I was gone most of the day shopping and when I came home, all those flags were back in my landscaping. Almost as if someone had been spooked by the police knocking on their door. Because maybe they thought the police were there about the flags. So while I was out shopping maybe someone decided she better put those flags back.

When Matthew got off the bus, I asked him if he had taken the flags in and he said no. Dave hadn't moved them either. And now, instead of being in a big cluster they were all over the ground.

Frankly, at this point, I was tired of the drama of it all. And now all the flags are buried under a foot of snow anyway.

But I did pursue the poison angle with the police department and they did return to Yeti's house because Barb's husband Chris saw the police car parked in front of their house. I figured if everything checked out, and the repellent Yeti was using wasn't toxic, I could at least stop worrying about something happening to a child or pet. Thanks to Barb, my roving photojournalist in the 'hood, we were able to google the repellent ourselves and I am happy to report that it is not toxic which is a very good thing because Yeti's yard is covered in it.




And I will say that the police have been very helpful. When I apologized for creating more work for them, the officer told me they want to know these things so they can document them. Our police department is the best. And I don't think they care very much for Smokey and Yeti. It's just a feeling I get when I talk to them on the phone.

Here's a little diagram I made. I hope you find it helpful.


Maybe it's just a coincidence that we seem to have a higher than normal wildlife mortality problem here in the 'hood. In addition to the raccoons, we've lost a ground squirrel and Barb said there's a rabbit that doesn't look like it's doing so hot.

So I guess I'll be monitoring the animals now, making sure they stay healthy because if we find a dead deer in the backyard between now and Christmas, the offspring are going to have a meltdown of absolutely epic proportions.

We will be sprinkling non toxic reindeer food on our lawn so that Santa's team can have a light snack after they drop off the loot on Christmas Eve. We encourage the feeding of all wildlife and have no wish to drive them away. The animals aren't hurting anything.

I can only hope Rudolph and the gang don't wander into the triangle of death.

The outcome might not be good.


P.S. This post is dedicated to Curtis. May he rest in peace.