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Nature. It's for real.
We have a false sense of security in the modern world where most 'threats' of an animal variety have been eradicated. But I'm here to tell you, you can sometimes be reminded that those threats still exist and that we still live in a wild natural world where we are not necessarily as safe as we thought.
Have you had a crazy animal encounter? It doesn't have to be something scary or dangerous, could be something beautiful and unexpected, or a 'holy ****' moment.
My close friends have heard one of my stories, but I'll share it again.
About 10 years ago, it was a Saturday evening around 5 p.m. I remember a lot of the details. I live in a rural neighborhood at the end of a cul-de-sac with woods on 2 sides of my property. I was grilling dinner for my wife and I. I had asian style Ichiban eggplant on the grill, and was getting ready to put on some 'Captain Crunch' chicken. It's weird I remember the details because I normally wouldn't. But then this happened.
I was heading out to the grill to check on the food and saw a flash of grey rushing out of the bushes coming towards me. We have a large grey Maine coon cat so my first thought was that it was her. But before I could even process that thought, the grey blur had leapt onto my chest and was trying to claw it's way up to my face. It was the mangiest nastiest looking raccoon I have ever seen in my life. I instictively knocked it to the ground with my arm and the thing just leapt right back onto me. I didn't really want to touch it - but it must have jumped on me 3 or 4 times before I decided to grab it with my hands and throw it as far from me as possible. Every time I threw it is just rushed me and leapt onto me again. I was able to get to my front door and get inside.
There were kids playing in the neighboring yard, otherwise I probably wouldn't have gone back out. My wife is yelling at me 'What is happening?!!' and I think I just said 'Not now!' and grabbed a 9mm I keep in a gun safe next to our bed. I went back out and as soon as I came around the corner it again leapt on me. I am an expert with a pistol, but let me tell you, trying to hit a crazed raccoon, running all around you, with your heart racing insanely, is not an easy task. I shot my chimney. I shot the garden hose. I shot the house. And finally I shot the raccoon. It did not seem to even faze him. And then, on my 4th or 5th shot, the 9mm jammed.
He leapt on me again, and after throwing him to the ground for what must've been the 8th or 9th time, I escaped into my truck. I had a .45 in the center console and got it. I shot that damned raccoon twice more before it finally stopped attacking me. Here is the aftermath.
On a humorous (kind of) note, after it was over, my friendly but alcoholic neighbor on one side of the house yells 'Whatcha shootin' at?'. My other useless neighbor came over and asked what was going on. He says 'I wondered what was going on?'. I said 'did it ever occur to you to ask why I might be yelling and shooting a weapon in my front yard and come help me?'. Useless just looked at me. You know, because he's useless.
I went inside to explain to my wife and let her know it was safe now and she asks me if I'm hurt. 'No - I'm fine' I said. Then she points at me. I had bloody claw marks all over my body, legs, chest, neck, arms. Adrenaline is an amazing thing because I had no idea the thing had torn me all up. One thing I've always been glad about is that he a) never got to my face, and b) for some strange reason, he never bit me during the entire 10 minute ordeal.
We call our local sheriff and they get here. The first thing they ask me is whether I had been drinking (I had a beer in my hand trying to calm down). I said 'Is that relevant?' lol... Then the stupid female deputy says 'Sir... what makes you think the animal was rabid?'. I told her that the fact it was trying to eat my face seemed to indicate that may have been the case. Then they went and looked at it and they said they'd have animal control come out. And of course, the raccoon was in fact rabid.
We turn off the grill, take the food inside, and get in the car to go to an urgent care (I'm okay, but know I will have to get the rabies vaccine). 5 minutes after leaving the house, we come upon a bad accident that must've happened a minute or two ahead of us. There are totalled cars, bloody people sitting in the median, and one wandering in the road. We help them (my wife and I are both RNs) until a State Trooper gets there and then continue to the urgent care. My wife was driving and pulls into the urgent care parking lot. It's no longer an urgent care, but is now a mortuary. Seems fitting. We decide to just go to the hospital where we work's ER. About a gazillion rabies injections later (they have to inject everywhere the skins was broken), we finally get back home around midnight.
The rewarmed eggplant and Captain Crunch chicken was awesome.
I made the mistake of posting some of my story on Facebook. The following Monday I arrive at my office to find hundreds of photos of raccoons everywhere. They even put raccoon tracks all over the floors and walls. I was finding raccoon-related stuff for the better part of a year.
I try to tell this story in a humorous way, but the truth is, it was scary and traumatizing. It was just one decent-sized raccoon, but it was insane. It took quite awhile for me to be able to head out to my grilling area without scanning every corner of the yard. I used to think raccoons were cute and charming. Not so much now.
We have a false sense of security in the modern world where most 'threats' of an animal variety have been eradicated. But I'm here to tell you, you can sometimes be reminded that those threats still exist and that we still live in a wild natural world where we are not necessarily as safe as we thought.
Have you had a crazy animal encounter? It doesn't have to be something scary or dangerous, could be something beautiful and unexpected, or a 'holy ****' moment.
My close friends have heard one of my stories, but I'll share it again.
About 10 years ago, it was a Saturday evening around 5 p.m. I remember a lot of the details. I live in a rural neighborhood at the end of a cul-de-sac with woods on 2 sides of my property. I was grilling dinner for my wife and I. I had asian style Ichiban eggplant on the grill, and was getting ready to put on some 'Captain Crunch' chicken. It's weird I remember the details because I normally wouldn't. But then this happened.
I was heading out to the grill to check on the food and saw a flash of grey rushing out of the bushes coming towards me. We have a large grey Maine coon cat so my first thought was that it was her. But before I could even process that thought, the grey blur had leapt onto my chest and was trying to claw it's way up to my face. It was the mangiest nastiest looking raccoon I have ever seen in my life. I instictively knocked it to the ground with my arm and the thing just leapt right back onto me. I didn't really want to touch it - but it must have jumped on me 3 or 4 times before I decided to grab it with my hands and throw it as far from me as possible. Every time I threw it is just rushed me and leapt onto me again. I was able to get to my front door and get inside.
There were kids playing in the neighboring yard, otherwise I probably wouldn't have gone back out. My wife is yelling at me 'What is happening?!!' and I think I just said 'Not now!' and grabbed a 9mm I keep in a gun safe next to our bed. I went back out and as soon as I came around the corner it again leapt on me. I am an expert with a pistol, but let me tell you, trying to hit a crazed raccoon, running all around you, with your heart racing insanely, is not an easy task. I shot my chimney. I shot the garden hose. I shot the house. And finally I shot the raccoon. It did not seem to even faze him. And then, on my 4th or 5th shot, the 9mm jammed.
He leapt on me again, and after throwing him to the ground for what must've been the 8th or 9th time, I escaped into my truck. I had a .45 in the center console and got it. I shot that damned raccoon twice more before it finally stopped attacking me. Here is the aftermath.
On a humorous (kind of) note, after it was over, my friendly but alcoholic neighbor on one side of the house yells 'Whatcha shootin' at?'. My other useless neighbor came over and asked what was going on. He says 'I wondered what was going on?'. I said 'did it ever occur to you to ask why I might be yelling and shooting a weapon in my front yard and come help me?'. Useless just looked at me. You know, because he's useless.
I went inside to explain to my wife and let her know it was safe now and she asks me if I'm hurt. 'No - I'm fine' I said. Then she points at me. I had bloody claw marks all over my body, legs, chest, neck, arms. Adrenaline is an amazing thing because I had no idea the thing had torn me all up. One thing I've always been glad about is that he a) never got to my face, and b) for some strange reason, he never bit me during the entire 10 minute ordeal.
We call our local sheriff and they get here. The first thing they ask me is whether I had been drinking (I had a beer in my hand trying to calm down). I said 'Is that relevant?' lol... Then the stupid female deputy says 'Sir... what makes you think the animal was rabid?'. I told her that the fact it was trying to eat my face seemed to indicate that may have been the case. Then they went and looked at it and they said they'd have animal control come out. And of course, the raccoon was in fact rabid.
We turn off the grill, take the food inside, and get in the car to go to an urgent care (I'm okay, but know I will have to get the rabies vaccine). 5 minutes after leaving the house, we come upon a bad accident that must've happened a minute or two ahead of us. There are totalled cars, bloody people sitting in the median, and one wandering in the road. We help them (my wife and I are both RNs) until a State Trooper gets there and then continue to the urgent care. My wife was driving and pulls into the urgent care parking lot. It's no longer an urgent care, but is now a mortuary. Seems fitting. We decide to just go to the hospital where we work's ER. About a gazillion rabies injections later (they have to inject everywhere the skins was broken), we finally get back home around midnight.
The rewarmed eggplant and Captain Crunch chicken was awesome.
I made the mistake of posting some of my story on Facebook. The following Monday I arrive at my office to find hundreds of photos of raccoons everywhere. They even put raccoon tracks all over the floors and walls. I was finding raccoon-related stuff for the better part of a year.
I try to tell this story in a humorous way, but the truth is, it was scary and traumatizing. It was just one decent-sized raccoon, but it was insane. It took quite awhile for me to be able to head out to my grilling area without scanning every corner of the yard. I used to think raccoons were cute and charming. Not so much now.