7br
11-08-2006, 12:21 PM
Three kids can eat up most of a person's free time and all of the family's disposable income. Between Jake's swimming, Clint's soccer, Grace's gymnastics and scouts for all three, Cori and I barely have time to sleep. It shouldn't be much of a surprise that 18 months after our move, we still had not gotten all of the effluvia in the garage taken care of. After three weekends of cleaning, I finally got enough stuff shoved to the edges that we can park both vehicles in the garage.
Cori is the leader of Gracie's Brownie troop. Basically, it came down to Cori taking it on, or no troop for Grace. (This is exactly how she wound up as a soccer coach for Jake) Cori was also suckered into running the first fund raiser which has been a royal pain in the keister. We had a hundred plus packages of nuts and chocolates in our spare bedroom. Naturally, the dogs decided to sample a box of peanut butter cups. A quick call to the vet and a dose of peroxide had the dogs puking up the remains of their culinary adventure in the backyard. (1 Tbsp of peroxide per 10 lbs of dog will have them heaving for the next 45 minutes. Mix it with dried milk to get them to drink it) Parents were slow picking up product and even slower turning in reciepts. With today being the audit from the grand poobah of the Girl Scout fundraisers and lacking about $250 of reciepts, Cori was a little stressed last night. Earlier in the day, two sets of the parents had called and assured us that they would run their reciepts by right after school. At 8:15pm, Cori's stress level peaked. She started calling around and we found out that while we were frantically trying to get 14 copies of paperwork in order and arranging funds to cover the product, they had tucked their little ones in bed and were retiring to bed for a restfull night themselves. I volunteered to run by and pick up their reciepts and egg their houses. I slipped my bunny slippers on and headed to the garage. Just as I opened the garage door, the other mother pulled into our drive. I escorted her into the living room and went back to my car. I backed up and reached for the garage door opener when I noticed what looked like a pile of oily rags on the garage floor directly under where my mercury tracer had been parked. A second look revealed two beady eyes and a long, ratlike tail. We had a 20lb possum in our garage.
My father taught me what to do in these situations. If you can get a clear shot, a .22 behind the ear works wonders, otherwise a louisville slugger will dispatch the critter for easy disposal. Naturally, I didn't follow either one of these suggestions. Instead, I went inside to get my wife, kids and other mother so I would have an audience. After 15 minutes of the kids oohhing and aahhing, I started to circle around it to scoot it out of the garage. At this point, my wife said we really should have a picture. I located the 35mm camera, but the flash was missing. Back to the office for the digital with the dead batteries. When I returned the the garage with the camera and trailing power cord, the possum had wedged itself between a toolbox and my workbench. As I approached, my wife and kids were telling me "Not to scare the poor thing". I took several pictures and then donned on my leather gloves in preparation for a possumectomy. For those of you without possum experience, let me inform you that what they lack in offensive skills, they more than make up for in toughness and sheer determination. It is my opinion that they are just too dumb to die. I grabbed the tail and started to drag it from its hiding spot. This really agitated the kids and they were yelling at me not to hurt it while all the time I could imagine my father saying "Why isn't it dead and buried by now?. I managed to get it dislodged from behind the toolbox and just about had it clear when it managed to snag a couple of little grills my oldest son had found on a camping trip. Two hefty shakes and the grills fell to the floor. A quick walk to the front yard and the possum was let free to trundle on off into the night grumbling about the rude treatment it received at my hands. With the emergency over and victory declared, I, myself, headed out into the night to collect the rest of the girl scout reciepts. As I drove off, my wife hollered from the front stoop "He looked hungry, do you think I should feed it?".
Cori is the leader of Gracie's Brownie troop. Basically, it came down to Cori taking it on, or no troop for Grace. (This is exactly how she wound up as a soccer coach for Jake) Cori was also suckered into running the first fund raiser which has been a royal pain in the keister. We had a hundred plus packages of nuts and chocolates in our spare bedroom. Naturally, the dogs decided to sample a box of peanut butter cups. A quick call to the vet and a dose of peroxide had the dogs puking up the remains of their culinary adventure in the backyard. (1 Tbsp of peroxide per 10 lbs of dog will have them heaving for the next 45 minutes. Mix it with dried milk to get them to drink it) Parents were slow picking up product and even slower turning in reciepts. With today being the audit from the grand poobah of the Girl Scout fundraisers and lacking about $250 of reciepts, Cori was a little stressed last night. Earlier in the day, two sets of the parents had called and assured us that they would run their reciepts by right after school. At 8:15pm, Cori's stress level peaked. She started calling around and we found out that while we were frantically trying to get 14 copies of paperwork in order and arranging funds to cover the product, they had tucked their little ones in bed and were retiring to bed for a restfull night themselves. I volunteered to run by and pick up their reciepts and egg their houses. I slipped my bunny slippers on and headed to the garage. Just as I opened the garage door, the other mother pulled into our drive. I escorted her into the living room and went back to my car. I backed up and reached for the garage door opener when I noticed what looked like a pile of oily rags on the garage floor directly under where my mercury tracer had been parked. A second look revealed two beady eyes and a long, ratlike tail. We had a 20lb possum in our garage.
My father taught me what to do in these situations. If you can get a clear shot, a .22 behind the ear works wonders, otherwise a louisville slugger will dispatch the critter for easy disposal. Naturally, I didn't follow either one of these suggestions. Instead, I went inside to get my wife, kids and other mother so I would have an audience. After 15 minutes of the kids oohhing and aahhing, I started to circle around it to scoot it out of the garage. At this point, my wife said we really should have a picture. I located the 35mm camera, but the flash was missing. Back to the office for the digital with the dead batteries. When I returned the the garage with the camera and trailing power cord, the possum had wedged itself between a toolbox and my workbench. As I approached, my wife and kids were telling me "Not to scare the poor thing". I took several pictures and then donned on my leather gloves in preparation for a possumectomy. For those of you without possum experience, let me inform you that what they lack in offensive skills, they more than make up for in toughness and sheer determination. It is my opinion that they are just too dumb to die. I grabbed the tail and started to drag it from its hiding spot. This really agitated the kids and they were yelling at me not to hurt it while all the time I could imagine my father saying "Why isn't it dead and buried by now?. I managed to get it dislodged from behind the toolbox and just about had it clear when it managed to snag a couple of little grills my oldest son had found on a camping trip. Two hefty shakes and the grills fell to the floor. A quick walk to the front yard and the possum was let free to trundle on off into the night grumbling about the rude treatment it received at my hands. With the emergency over and victory declared, I, myself, headed out into the night to collect the rest of the girl scout reciepts. As I drove off, my wife hollered from the front stoop "He looked hungry, do you think I should feed it?".