ROCKY RACCOON

Last week we were hit again with some rain.  Shocker, right? 

Once again, despite the fact that we had our schedule up and ready to go, we were forced to tweak it to compensate for the rain.  But, this time around, we were also in the middle of something personal too – having a new roof put on.  Obviously, roofers can’t work in the rain either.  No major deal really.  Honestly, I found myself feeling a partnership with my rained-out-roofer-friends as they too were experiencing frustrating issues with rain (not to mention this time bumped up against a holiday weekend to boot!)  What was supposed to be a day and a half event has now turned into a six day suspended engagement.  (We got rain again today…so it’s looking like we’ll be extending it at least into day seven!) 

So why am I going into such detail about the time frame here?  It’s mainly because of Rocky Raccoon.  Let me explain further…

The roofers came and worked all day Wednesday, left late that night giving us an almost completed roof.  They left their roll-off dumpster (which was conveniently set in our driveway), their tool trailer, and a few other items such as ladders and supplies.  We, like most Americans, had scheduled friends to come over for the 4^thof July.  We have a PERFECT view of our town’s firework show from our driveway (when it isn’t blocked by a roll-off dumpster).  At the time of scheduling, I never dreamed there would be roll-offs, trailers and other supplies littering my yard or potentially blocking our view of where we normally sit to watch the city fireworks.  And, even last week when the roofers came, I figured all would be done and gone in a matter of two days.  So, when we awoke to a dead raccoon in our yard Thursday morning, (compliments of Marty the killer hound dog) I didn’t think it would be a big deal to just toss Rocky’s dead carcass into the dumpster…

Final resting place of poor Rocky

Can you see where I am going with this friends?

Here’s how it played out:  Thursday morning, we tossed Rocky into the dumpster.  Later Thursday morning, we got rain.  Things eventually warmed up and cleared off, but the roofers didn’t come back to finish.  We KIND OF thought they might return on Friday, but with it being a holiday weekend, no one showed.  You know who did show up?  The HOT, Nebraska sun.  Then came Saturday, and oh what a nice SUNNY day that was too!! (I find it beyond ironic that almost every day this spring and summer has been UNSEASONABLY cool, cloudy and wet, until we get a dead raccoon in our yard.  Only THEN does the sun decide to show up and then stay for a couple of days!!  Can we say Murphy’s Law?  I think we CAN!) 

As we did some preparing for our 4^th of July party we realized that the roll-off blocking our drive way and our usual 4^th of July seats were only PART of an overwhelming problem.  Poor old Rocky Raccoon was smelling mighty ripe!!  We thought about going dumpster diving to fish him out and bury him in the yard, but he had started to…um…bloat a bit…to put it kindly….making us concerned that the possible handling of his body might pose an even bigger smelly problem.  I grabbed some trash bags and tried to “seal” him off in our dumpster.  I also tried coating him with various sprays like Chlorox, Lysol, and bug spray.  If I sound desperate, it is only because I was.  The smell wasn’t so bad as long as you stayed up wind of him, but as with any 4^th of July event, we knew all of us would be moving constantly around our house and driveway area.  I was so thankful when we decided to shoot off fireworks and the smells of burnt gunpowder started overtaking Rocky’s aroma.  I’m not one to spend an extravagant amount of money on fireworks, but there was a strong urge in me this year to go and completely BUY OUT the entire contents of the five firework tents in town just so we could continue to burn black powder ALL NIGHT LONG.  I wouldn’t have cared how loud or obnoxious the firecracker – so long as it’s after shock carried with it a smoke smell!!  I am here to tell you, any tears that might have swelled up in our eyes on this night would not have been from patriotic emotion.  Nope.  Any actions and/or emotions were pretty much a direct result of rotting raccoon smells.  (Have you ever planned a party around smells?  I tend to be a problem solver, and kind of figure most things can either be handled or possibly even forgotten about – you know, “no big deal if BLANK doesn’t happen”.  Let me tell you, rotting carcass aromas are a BIT of a different story). 

If only Rocky was in liquid waste form we could have sucked him up and out in no time.  Even our septic trucks couldn’t solve this problem!! Ha!

Fortunately, we have wonderful friends who laughed along with us, graciously and strategically placed their lawn chairs appropriately, and still managed to enjoy the rest of the fireworks with us.  But, considering the strength of smells escaping the roll-off, I am sure this will be one July 4th that will go down in history as the “year of Rocky.”

SIDE NOTE:  As of this morning, we got rain yet again and therefore no roofers in sight.  Rocky is still residing in his roll-off which continues to be right outside in our driveway.  The “year of Rocky” may be over for our 4^th of July friends, but for the Kubiks, the smell goes on!!