Raccoons

(Note- as I get into the habit, I'm going to try to limit the editing I do, since that is the part I most dread and most keeps me from it. Please forgive)

I worked at a waterfowl conservancy one summer, which is essentially a place that breeds endangered (and non-endangered) ducks, geese, and swans for release or zoos or sometimes private collectors. I lived on the grounds with my boss and the grounds-keeper, and the other employees lived pretty close, so it wasn't uncommon for us to go out to eat together. It was in a fairly rural part of Connecticut, so of course the closest Chinese food was a terrible all-you-can eat buffet that would ruin your digestive track for weeks at a time. One night we came back from that greasy but delicious GI destroyer and I was immediately in the john for about three hours as my body tried to cleanse itself. When the flood gates finally closed, I remembered that I was actually scheduled for a interview with the Magic Online people for a moderating position. I was thinking about canceling it because it would be awkward to have to repeatedly run off in the middle of it, when I heard what sounded like a gunshot from bird enclosure, followed quickly by two more.

"Hmmmm thats's odd," I thought to myself, but since I was in a place where everyone owned four or five guns, I didn't think much of it. A minute later, though, my cellphone rang. It was my boss. A raccoon had gotten into the enclosure and killed a half-dozen of our chickens. I had to come help him look for the perpetrator. My stomach twisted into a knot, and not from the General Tso's. Raccoons are mean motherfuckers, and actually seem to kill stuff just out of curiosity or fun. My boss one time had several dozen quail murdered by a pair of them. They had just come in and squeezed their little heads off. Sometimes the raccoons took a bit or two, but mostly the left the corpses laying around.

But my interview!
Doesn't matter.
But my bowels!
Doesn't matter.

The place's grounds-keeper had gone out and I was the only person on premises to help. I briefly e-mailed the contact I had for the interview and, grudging and miserable, walked into the night to go find my boss.

On the property we had some birds of whose species there are only only a few thousands left in the wild. We also had birds that were slated to be sold to zoos for tens of thousands of dollars. I knew we had to find that raccoon. It was just that my innards were in such revolt that I had to make a constant, concerted effort just to keep myself isotonic with my environment. But you gotta do what you gotta do. My boss showed me the gory chicken coup to give me an idea of what could happen if the raccoon found its way into the pens of anything important. It really did seem like it had been enjoying itself the way the blood was festively smeared all over the walls and floor, with the entrails hanging around like streamers. The survivors cowered in loft. I was determined to make the raccoon pay.

As I was thinking of all the terrible things I would do to that stupid mammal, my boss handed me a gun and a flashlight. "Whoa. I have no idea how to use this thing." "Ummm... point and shoot, idiot." We had a good rapport. "Don't you have, like, a sword or a taser or something?" "Shut up. What did you think we were going to do. Let's go." I've used shotguns and rifles before, but only in the context of Boy Scout Camp. The only pistols I had ever used were in Counter-Strike, and sometimes in Unreal Tournament, but only before I found a nice flak cannon. The only hint he gave me was to use the flashlight to catch the eye-shine of the raccoon, and we went off our separate ways, keeping parallel to make sure the intruder couldn't get past us.

We didn't find him. We spent at least an hour checking every tree and bush he could be hiding in. Hopefully he had left after murdering the chickens, and hadn't made it into the main enclosure. Still, we had to make sure the electrified fence hadn't somehow been compromised. Of course that meant -I- had to check while my boss continued to make the rounds of the high-priority tenants. So I spent the next chunk of my night walking the entire length of the fence that surrounds the entire conservancy. In the dark. Alone. With a gun. While my body desperately tried to rid itself of excess MSG. And did I mention it was electrified? And there wasn't really a path that went around it so much as just brambles. Lots and lots of brambles. Many flesh wounds and minor electrocutions later, I happily reported back to my boss that I didn't find any holes under or in the fence, and could 100% confirm that it was in fact electrified the entire way around. I breathed a sigh of relief as he said he hadn't found anything either, so the raccoon must have left after his chicken massacre. "Do one more walk around, though, just to make sure."

I ended up getting back to my bathroom at around 2:00 am and my bed at 2:30. Luckily my interviewer was in PST, and was a night owl, so I still got the chance to exhaustedly do my interview. One positive was that the night had given plenty of pre-and-post interview small talk, and they did end up offering me the position.

This is why I hate raccoons.