Defending The Fort, part 2 of 3

Day Seven. 

A warm front has pulled into Secret Spot Park.  The air is muggy, the no-see-ums are thick, and it’s really hard to sleep at night.  It must not be any different for the wildlife, because the raccoons are running back and forth across the west campgrounds in broad daylight searching for somewhere to lay low.  It’s bad enough to find their little hand prints all over every surface in the cook tent in the morning, but now they have the nerve to run around in broad daylight looking for trouble.  I am dropping a new cd into the boom box. As I turn around, a raccoon has scooted 15 feet up the palm tree next to my tent.

“OH, no you don’t!  Get outta there!”  I charge the tree, waving my arms wildly, and the raccoon drops down and rushes to the mangroves.

I win.

Moments later, he’s back, heading back up the same tree.

“Really?  NOOOOO!”  I cry out.  But that coon keeps scooting up to the top and then disappears up into the palm boughs.  He pulls aside a few prongs and looks down at me.

That was the last straw.

I look and look for something to throw.  Ah ha, the yard fogger.  I toss it up to the top of the tree, it falls back down.  I toss it again, hoping to knock down the coon.  I miss again.

Toss, and miss.  Toss and miss.  Toss, and miss, wow I’m really a bad shot.  Toss and miss.  Toss, and, the fogger doesn’t come back down.

Crap, it’s hung up in the palm tree.  I’m standing there, a sweaty mess. I grab the sunscreen bottle.  Toss, and miss, toss and miss. A dozen more times toss and miss, then the sunscreen doesn’t come back down.  The coon peers down at me.

That was the last straw. 

Beads of sweat dripping into my eyes, I grab Buddy’s big partly chewed Christmas bone.  That will do it!  I toss the bone, and it does not come down out of the palm.  NOOO!  The coon is rustling around up there.  Maybe he’ll spray himself with the fogger.  I cannot allow that dang critter to stay up there, right next to my tent.  I grab Buddys blaze orange Kong bone.  Apparently I’m creating a shortage of space up there, the Raccoon is shifting around trying to get comfortable.  I whale the Kong bone.  Toss and miss.  I run and pick it up from the other side of the palm.  Toss, and, BINGO it’s a DIRECT HIT!  The raccoon jumps up from the palm branches, and clings to the trunk of the tree.  I, the stealth hunter take aim a second time and WHAP another direct hit that drops the Raccoon off of the palm tree right in front of me.  We stand face to face, it rises up on it’s hind legs. 

C’mon, bring it.

It blasts around the tent and runs across the street to Dennis and Carol’s. 

I win.

Then I look up and realize my fogger, sunscreen and Buddy’s big Christmas bone are all up in the tree. I walk over to Lois and Buddy’s.

“Hey, Buddy, would you happen to have a ladder I could borrow?”