Shari Johnson/Publissher
At approximately 1 a.m. this morning, my 87 year old mother, Violet Hardway, came knocking on our door and burst in telling my husband David there was an intruder in her house. To say that she was more than a little excited does not even begin to describe her state of mind. But upon telling us the ”person” shut themselves in the bathroom and refused to come out, David and I looked at one another like she had possibly lost her mind, but she was very upset, so we took the threat serious.
Hero that he is, my husband slid into his ”crocs” grabbed his pistol and headed next door. He was gone for several minutes, when I began to wonder what might have transpired? When he finally returned, he informed us that there was indeed ”someone” shut up in Mother’s bathroom. It was a Raccoon! She had obviously startled it when she yelled ”Who’s there?” and it accidentally pushed the door shut. When David opened up the door it was atop a wall cabinet, probably having second thoughts about breaking into this house.
The next dilemma was how he was going to get it out the house without damaging Mother’s home. It had knocked over several things and found some shiny jewelry to play with, but overall hadn’t damaged anything. David determined the pistol was not an option. He sent our grandson Luke back to our house to retrieve his air rifle and he and the Raccoon squared off. It would be great to tell you that nothing was harmed in the making of this story, but that’s not usually how a “man vs. critter” story turns out in West Virginia. David had trapped the raccoon under a cabinet and it’s criminal career of breaking and entering is now ended.
As for how the raccoon managed to get into my Mother’s house, that occurred through a doggie door she had installed many years ago. It had never been an issue but it certainly was now. Being that she no longer has a dog, today we will take care of taking out the doggie door and preventing any more critters from getting in to Mother’s house.
It’s a slow news day on the Ridge, but I thought this was a worthy headline for a sunny Sunday morning.
