I hate to disturb the zombie racoon on his birthday, but…

I have learned to co-exist with racoons in my trash. They can scrounge all they want as long as they close the lid and don’t make a mess of our walkway. Can I get them to teach my son to close the lid?

But this is war.

A few nights ago I heard someone walking around at night. Not on the floor, but on our ceiling. Since the only thing above us is the attic, I knew it was vermin. It wasn’t the cute little scurry sounds of a mouse. It was the sound of something walking and then clearly lying down. The sound my dog makes when he paces around before planting himself in the right spot.

I stayed up listening to my new enemy. He slept directly above my head and I had visions of him falling through the ceiling like Paul Blart out of a duct and landing directly on top of me. We would square off. I would definitely lose because I ain’t fighting no racoon (could you hear my fake southern accent on that?)!

My husband chalked it up to the wind. “Go to sleep honey. It’s just the wind.”

Ah ha! He is working with the vermin. Duly noted.

The next morning (after a paltry 3 hours of sleep), I cleared the closet to get in the attic to investigate. What I found were remnants of a birthday party. Birthday napkins. No mouse could have done that. No mouse could have eaten all the insulation off our HVAC either. I don’t care if it is the ‘coon’s birthday. He is going down!

As neither my husband or myself really wanted to confront the vermin and I kept losing rock/paper/scissors, we decided to wait another day to see if it was, in fact, the wind.

No sign of him. Mister had warned him to move on. I am convinced! Until…

We woke the next day to the smell of dead vermin. Don’t tell me you have never smelled a dead mouse in your house, because that is a lie! Isn’t it? Why is that smell so familiar?

We scoured the house because Mister said there was no racoon in the attic. He distracted me by making us clean out our son’s room which is our usual #1 guess for the location of dying vermin. #2 is in the garage. #3 the kitchen. The attic is a distant #6.

Finally, I went up the ladder to see. One of the napkins had moved and you could smell dead. As I am deathly afraid of the racoon apocalypse I closed the attic door and decided to go in hiding. We left for the weekend.

I know there is a zombie racoon waiting for me in that attic. I know now with certainty that he has brought our rubbish up there for his feasts (cue birthday napkin) and that he is slowly eating his way through my ceiling to land on my head while sleeping. Zombie racoons are nocturnal too.

So friends, if I turn into a zombie it will be 100% Mister’s fault.