So remember how just yesterday I voiced how I was worried that a raccoon would appear near our ground-level window and scratch Avery square in the face?
Yeah Thomas and I just got finished scaring off an altogether-too-bold raccoon who appeared at that very window no more than a couple of hours ago.
Thomas was PVP-ing with Jeremy on GW2 while I was just chilling at my computer. The window was open, and Avery was looking out of it as usual; enjoying the nice weather, watching over the garden, that kind of thing.
Then out of nowhere, Avery seems to get pretty freaked out. He turns his head to look at the right corner of the window, then basically falls over onto the chair beneath the window. He jumps back up and stares fervently at the same corner. I knew something was up.
I sprang to the window and shut it the whole way. There are two panels, so I left one completely open to make it easier for Avery to stay sitting comfortably at the window if he wanted to continue to look out – which he did indeed.
I looked to see if there was anything there, but it was too dark to tell. Took a long ass while to find a flashlight, especially since Thomas’ regular one broke not too long ago and we misplaced a second one. I should’ve thought to use my phone as a flashlight, but didn’t.
Once I shone a light on the critter, it seemed to get even more brazen. It was hiding underneath the chair that we’d placed next to the window when sitting outside a few weeks ago. It’s nice sitting by the window as we can typically get Avery to come up to say “hi” to us while we’re outside.
Anyway, so Avery actually stared the thing down and tried to hit it in the face a couple of times. He’d been hissing a lot throughout, but as the raccoon kept inching closer but wansn’t able to go through the window, I do think he felt a wee bit more comfortable. Regardless, he definitely took this thing as a threat.
Each time the raccoon raised its face and started sniffing at him, he’d try taking another swipe at it’s face, obviously not hitting anything but glass since the window pane was shut (Thomas is pretty proud of Avery for trying to fight; he expected our cat to scurry off or hunch over and hide – but raccoons are apparently not as scary as a vacuum cleaner; a fight with a raccoon can be won!).
Thomas wrapped up gaming and came to join us. He held the flashlight while I took (a lot of) pictures. The raccoon just kept feeling more and more comfortable. There was no way he was leaving on his own, nor did I want him to, as I wanted to scare him into not feeling fully safe coming back. I didn’t want him fucking with Avery if he sauntered over here a few days from now.
Thomas and I went outside, taking a flashlight and a hockey stick (well Thomas took the hockey stick – I knew noise was enough to get him to run the hell away, so I knew we wouldn’t really need any big sticks). The curious thing saw the light from the flashlight and actually came round the corner of the house to “meet” us. I then started chasing him down and making some loud grunting noises at him, scaring him shitless until he ran as fast and far as he could. He was out of the backyard within a minute or so.
Avery kept checking the window even after he’d gone to see if he’d come back. So far, he hasn’t yet. My guess is he might come back tonight while we’re asleep, though I would never really know about it.
We’re definitely not leaving that window open while we’re sleeping anymore. Out of the question. And we’ll be sure to physically be in the room to monitor the window whenever we leave it open at any time of night.
To be fair, if I saw a rectangle of light in the middle of the darkness that housed a cute little cat staring into the distance, I’d probably get curious and go take a look, too, if I were a raccoon.
Either way, I doubt we’ve seen the last of this little fella.
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