Ballard Street by Jerry Van Amerongen for March 21, 2014

Road Trip!!

Wait till they figure out how to drive.

Do raccoons ever grow up or are they teenagers forever like ninja turtles?

Actually….there are raccoons driving a car in this Wendy’s commercial…

The bad news is, in order to see them, you have to watch a Wendy’s commercial….

Some years ago, I bought a package of assorted large muffins at Costco, to share the next morning with coworkers at an all-weekend event.

I stayed overnight first with friends who lived closer to the venue… and, as the night was rather cold, left the muffins in my car.

I’d accidentally missed closing a back window by maybe two inches…. I swear that’s all!

In the morning, the package was ripped open, and most of the tops had been eaten…. which the local raccoons obviously preferred to the bottoms, just like that Seinfeld episode.

There were crumbs, chocolate chips (which they left behind) and bits plastic and paper EVERYWHERE…and squashed-blueberry raccoon footprints all over the dashboard, steering wheel, the inside of every window…even the cloth roof liner.It took an hour just to get it sufficiently clean to drive.

You’d be hard-pressed to find that many blueberries were you looking for them while eating the muffins…..In fact, there seemed to be more debris plastered inside my car than could have been contained in the whole dozen..and yet I’d say about 2/3 of every one was left…and NO, I didn’t take them to the event.

I have a love/hate relationship with racoons……They can mess things up a lot. And trust me you don’t want many of them in your house, but I suppose that’s up to you…But on the other hand, I have to admire a little creature that outsmarts me so many time. BTW, there is a way to protect bird feeders….A baffle…

“Rocky Raccoon” the Beatles.

Very rare, uncommonly intelligent and resourceful, the North American Gray Raccoon is the prankster and rascal in any urban neighborhood. Often traveling in pairs or families, these critters as lovable and playful as they are can cause havoc on any block and Ballard Street is no exception. Bob had invited these late night trouble makers into the yard by hiding bits of bologna and old carrots in empty flower pots and under the garage down spouts and the game was on. First they took every light bulb they could unscrew and buried them in the alley behind Trooper’s yard. Then for fun they chewed holes in the garden hose. They glued the mail box flag to the side and filled the box with Bob’s favorite rocks. They filled Shirley’s three buckle galoshes with potting soil and carried off her gloves. Then they painted dancing nymphs on the garage door and hung every tool from the chest in the tree with fishing line. They strung Christmas lights around the bird bath so it was no surprise to hear them playing jiggle bells on the car horn. How cute.

Just wait until the squirrels move in….

Oh, those wascally wacoons!

Just like The True Blue Scouts of Sugar Man Swamp! Really good middle grade book, if you are interested in checking it out.

This comic is crazy. Coons don’t play with car horns! They are way too busy stealing the hubcaps!

Never trust racoons—they’re evil!

I wish we had raccoons in the UK.

Hey, man…. your name isn’t Nermal so I’m not sending you anywhere.

Nermal ain’t normal……… he’d be better appreciated abroad.

You would think of that ESSEX. lol

Night all…

Good Night all. Love all the Raccoon pictures.

Good morning Balladeers and Tigressy!!

Royal!

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And if Bob would leave the keys in the car, then again he would no longer be bothered by the late night horn. Or any time of day, really.