Love Stinks

When you love your friends, you will do anything for them. Especially when they call you for rodent removal advice and especially when they sound desperate. Apparently, we are now "experts" in rodent removal since we have had a bad case of Rats. Cindy calls last night--whispering--"I need some advice. I think there is something alive in my dryer vent hose!" I said, "Well, pull out the dryer and lift the hose so the 'thing' will scramble back out."
Cindy: "NOOOO! I am standing on a stool looking over the back of the dryer! I am not getting that close!" Me: (trying to be supportive yet not enabling) "Gee..wish I lived closer so I could come over and help.." Cindy: (squeals) "It moved!! and there is a little rip in the dyer tubing!!" Me: Where is Tim?? Cindy: At Youth group at church. Me: Alright. I am coming over.
So with rat cage and a miniature baseball bat in hand (for effect), off I went. Long story short, I went outside holding the cage up against the vent HOLE (no cover on this, people) and Cindy banged the dryer tubing and turned on the dryer. Well, he must of thought Christmas had come early, because he didn't budge. Me:'Turn off the dryer and bang on the vent again, Cindy.'
Picture this, she is perched on top of the dryer with a broom partially covering the ever enlarging hole in the tubing, and a mop banging the poor creature to move on out of his personal sauna! I am standing outside with a flashlight between my legs holding the cage handle with one hand and the cage trap door with the other. Well, disrupted, the animal comes scrambling out of the vent, into the cage. I can't get the door down and am hollering at Cindy that "I've got it!!!" Well, it has enough of that and realizes where it is, does a 180 and back into the vent it goes, but not before it let me know that it was indeed NOT a rat, but a POLECAT as we call them in Arkansas. Commonly known as a SKUNK. Back into the house I go, crawl on top of the dryer and bang the Bejesus out of that tubing so Skunky evacuates AGAIN and is Gone Daddy Gone out into the cover of darkness. PEWWWWWW! Cindy lights big vanilla candle and leaves it in the laundry room checking it about 15 minutes later she says, "I think the smell is gone!" Sniffing the air I observe, "Not unless it has been replaced by a Vanilla scented skunk fart." Needless to say, I had to 4 bag my jeans and shirt and put on a pair of Tim's big orange basketball shorts. I stopped by church on the way home and wielding my mini-bat, gave Tim a hard way to go re: home maintenance and rodent prevention. Do you know what he had to say in his defense? "Hey, those shorts look pretty good on you!" Those shorts look pretty good on you too in the pic below... :)

This is Tim checking out the skunk sich. (as in situation)
What is going on here???? I hope the gentle cycle is on...He owes me big. I am now praying over my favorite jeans and soaking them in Hydrogen peroxide, dish soap and baking soda. *Sigh* I love my friends. They really give me good blog material. OK maybe Good is too STRONG a word...