I love this:
Rabid animals are, of course, no laughing matter. The rabies virus can infect the central nervous system, resulting in disease and death, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But that happens after a host of increasingly scary symptoms: partial paralysis, agitation, hallucinations, hydrophobia. A British man and two children died in Morocco after they were bitten by a rabid cat.
So it was not surprising that when people in the city of Milton, W.Va., saw raccoons behaving weirdly, they involved the local police.
Officers staked out the area where the suspect animals were hanging out, looking for any signs of the masked perpetrators.
But when they caught two of them, they realized they were dealing with a different kind of issue.
The raccoons weren’t rabid. They were drunk.
The raccoons, apparently, had been feasting on crab apples that had fermented on the tree, causing the small animals to walk around “staggering and disoriented,” police said.
But here is my absolute favorite part of the story:
The apprehended animals were held in custody and allowed to sober up in what can only be deemed a raccoon drunk tank.
Get some, raccoons.
Also, I’m sober, but I’ll be damned if that isn’t a good looking raccoon.
BGinCHI
Raccoon Lives Matter.
schrodingers_cat
It is a good looking raccoon. I concur.
kindness
Where I grew up in the suburbs of NYC we had raccoons in the yard all the time. We ignored them as we secured our trash well enough and our dog didn’t chase them. But the adults were mean. You didn’t see them in the day for the most part. And if you ran into them at night you let them go by and didn’t mess. I knew a guy who had adopted an orphan as a baby. Baby raccoons are so sweet and just like kittens. When it grew up it was great with that guy but had to be in a sturdy cage if anyone else was in the room. No….not pet material.
trollhattan
Fucking raccoon(s) raided my pond last week, wiping out most of the fish and the lily. They are all On My List!
Elizabelle
Loved that story.
Steeplejack
There’s a raccoon/cocoon “bitterness and resentment” joke in there somewhere.
Major Major Major Major
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: We have raccoons here in beautiful uptown Glendale, I don’t worry about the cocker running into them when the dogs go out cause she’ll just bark a bit and run, I worry about the yorkiepom cause she’ll try to pick a fight with them.
Aleta
Video about an older cat in a feral colony who’s become a wonderful pet.
https://twitter.com/dodo/status/1062481232238276608
I watched the first time w/o the sound and liked it better w/o the music.
Yarrow
@Major Major Major Major: He’s not a good person.
M31
I had some memorable run-ins with drunk woodchucks when I lived in Michigan — same as these guys they’d eat all these fermented apples off the ground and then just lie on their backs with their huge pre-hibernation bellies sticking out, giving you the stink-eye.
“You want a piece of me, two-legs???!!?!”
smintheus
With the local deer you never now whether it’s he rutting or the fermented apples.
geg6
@Major Major Major Major:
Jesus. Not surprised after his white man only for the Dem nominee rant, though.
M31
@Major Major Major Major:
hahahaha first twitter comment “He can run as a Republican now!”
Major Major Major Major
@Yarrow: never got the impression that he was.
Roger Moore
@kindness:
Somebody ought to start breeding them the way the Russians bred domesticated foxes. If you could get them to be as friendly as those foxes are, I’m sure they’d make wonderful, if occasionally exasperating, pets.
debbie
We’ve had drunken birds when winters are cold and there’s a lot of snow on the ground. I haven’t seen any actually staggering, but there have been plenty of meandering footprints in the snow.
Barbara
@M31: Hmm, I noticed that the “click to edit” is showing for recent comments written by others. At any rate, my drunk animal story is when I was in Martinique last year sitting at an outdoor bar waiting for my husband and son to return from a dive, I noticed that some very small birds began perching on shot glasses and pecking feverishly to lap up the liquor still remaining (in one case, a full glass). I had a raccoon that used to get into my dog food that I left outside in a container I thought was secure. Eventually, I moved it inside, but before then, one night I turned on the light at my back door and saw him/her, and he/she made it very clear that I needed to stay on the other side of that door or I would be sorry. They are fierce and smart and adapting well to urban living.
Frankensteinbeck
I’m pretty sure this counts as domestic affairs: I’ve gotten the feedback back on the manuscript of A Rag Doll’s Guide To Enchantment And Murder. About to start corralling beta readers. I sent an email to a second agent, which is a scary, confusing process. I also did some exploratory work on the next book, the cyberpunk one. Oh, and I went another step along the process of forcing my publisher to pay me. Early, mild stuff, yet. Gotta lay the groundwork of giving them a chance.
Looking at all that, I guess I was more productive than I felt. When your job is as much thinking as acting, it can sometimes not be obvious even to me how much I’ve worked.
TenguPhule
TMI, John.
oatler.
“Bob’s Burgers” is helping bring acceptability to raccoon culture with Little King Trashmouth and El Diablo.
TenguPhule
@Roger Moore:
I welcome our bandit faced overlords.
But seriously, raccoons are too clever and too curious to be good pets. They’re like really smart cats that have opposable thumbs. They know how to open doors!
schrodingers_cat
Drunk monkeys can be a holy terror and they travel in huge groups. Scary really.
ETA: One can see the evolutionary roots of the frat boy behavior //
Kyle
One of those raccoons needs to be named Otis.
I’ll see myself out.
TenguPhule
@Major Major Major Major: For someone who’s supposed to be good with the media, he’s not been doing well lately.
ruemara
@Major Major Major Major: I just posted about that!
piratedan
@TenguPhule: sounds like they should be candidates for Uplift….
MomSense
My kid has me watching BBC One. Right now racer snakes (in packs!!!) are hunting Iguanas. Fucking terrifying.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: I would rather watch Trump than that, and that’s saying something.
Roger Moore
@Major Major Major Major:
This is my shocked face.
Genine
@Major Major Major Major:
Not suprised.
TenguPhule
@MomSense:
Actually not a pack. They’re just so many of them there and all of them are hungry. But its still every snake for themselves.
debbie
@MomSense:
Only very slightly better than a pack of spiders!
BGinCHI
@MomSense: Watched the first half hour of Gravity with Xavi last night and crushed his dream of being an astronaut.
#ExtremeParenting
TenguPhule
Mattis is a fucking tool. Those troops are not going to be with their families this holiday season.
Frankensteinbeck
@Major Major Major Major:
I’ve got no investment in the guy. If it’s a real accusation and he’s a domestic abuser, toss him in jail and it’s a shame for Stormy, but that’s it. If he’s innocent, I hope that becomes clear and they continue needling Trump. If the wife does publicly support the allegations, I’ll be on her side, and to be honest I’m only waiting because the GOP loves false accusations and police have already shown they want to harass him.
BGinCHI
@TenguPhule: Heard McCaffery describe him today as a “military intellectual.”
I guess everything is relative.
JPL
@Major Major Major Major: The only person that I feel for is Stormy because she tends to attract creepy men.
Jay
@Major Major Major Major:
LAPD officers in West Los Angeles have responded to an incident involving Michael Avenatti, where he is detained during the process of taking an incident report, sources tell @NBCNews – @anblanx
MomSense
@WaterGirl:
I know!!! I was screaming. The snakes were working together.
Martin
Drunk raccoons reminds me of one of the better Dwarf Fortress bugs (features?)
I’m an avid DF player, and the game is simply a playground of strange exploits and weird shit you can do.
Mnemosyne
I had to look up whether scientists still think raccoons are related to bears, and it turns out that the current consensus is that they’re probably more closely related to weasels and other mustelids. Which makes more sense, personality-wise.
JPL
@Jay: So does this mean he’s not running for president?
Frankensteinbeck
@Martin:
I love Dwarf Fortress, and I hate god damn weredeers.
oldster
“Also, I’m sober, but I’ll be damned if that isn’t a good looking raccoon.”
Oh great. Instead of beer goggles, you’re wearing a raccoon mask.
Jay
@Frankensteinbeck:
Double yup???
wasabi gasp
Sounds like someone wants to ferment their berries.
MomSense
Now “yellow crazy ants” are attacking red crabs. The ants spray acid at the crabs’ eyes.
Duane
@Roger Moore: Racoon’s are viscious little critters. Friend’s dad coon hunted. Never fight with a racoon.
JPL
Twitter tells me Mira Ricardel is gone and the judge is skeptical about Acosta’s free press case. Does this mean we are f.ked.
Frankensteinbeck
@Duane:
Yeah. Always add a solvent before trying to mix raccoons into cake batter.
EDIT –
Not your day for typos, is it? I feel you, bro/sis/other.
Mnemosyne
@Frankensteinbeck:
Yeah, I’m not going to rush to attack him, but I’m not going to rush to his defense, either. I’m willing to wait and see how much substance is there.
Jay
@JPL:
It means the smarter news orgs are going with less twitter hype and more sober statements,
While all in for Trump Orgs like TMZ are all in on “domestic violence” and “arrested”.
Instant news is often wrong.
BTW, Avenatti isn’t running for President. Wikipedia has a list of who’s running, and he’s not on it.
Oprah isn’t running either.
Nor is Hillary Clinton.
Or Chelsea Clinton.
Roger Moore
@Frankensteinbeck:
Are your problems with your publisher going to cause problems with the TV version of the “Please Don’t Tell My Parents” books?
Jay
@JPL:
It’s a Trump appointed judge.
Frankensteinbeck
@Roger Moore:
There is no TV version, and there definitely won’t be unless I can get the rights back. I at least got them to admit it fell through, but they won’t give me the adaptation rights back so I can get a better agent.
Duane
@Frankensteinbeck: Mix the solvent with paint to get a richer, smoother racoon batter. I have a newsletter available. Barbecue coon is surprisingly good.
Frankensteinbeck
@Duane:
Please accept this slow clap for an excellent, sportsman(woman/thing)like, and quick-witted reply.
Martin
@Frankensteinbeck: I miss the carp from back around 0.28 or so. If a dwarf got within a tile of water with carp nearby, the carp would grab them and drag them to their death. At embark I’d have to go around and forbid everything within 2 tiles of any reasonably sized water or else all my dwarves would be drowned by the end of summer.
lamh36
Uh huh…
ruemara
@JPL: Are you kidding. He’s very presidential!
@lamh36: But Pelosi is the corporate monster
satby
I like raccoons, I’ve rescued a couple of babies after mom was killed by a car (two different times). They went to wildlife rehabbers each time. They’re adorable when infants and obnoxious once sexual maturity kicks in. Just like a lot of humans tbh. Wild animals belong in the wild; unlike my former country neighbors I saw no reason to wantonly kill them.
Same goes for bats. I love bats.
lamh36
And yet Nancy Pelosi’s leadership is the one being targeted…smh…Schumer’s the one who should be gone.
Mandalay
@JPL:
Melania silently handed her husband the envelope containing the pee pee photos. There was no need to mail it now. There never was, really; she always knew that Donald would see things her way.
Roger Moore
@Kyle:
Isn’t Rocky the obvious name?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@lamh36: I admit I haven’t followed this closely, but have the Five White Guys ever offered a rationale for getting rid of Pelosi other than variants on “She’s old”?
Aleta
A few years ago domestic v. laws here were changed: police must take one party into custody if they think an argument would continue after they left, or if there’s been a threat or a gun is displayed (or a gun is in the house?–not sure). (They must separate the two and speak to each privately.) Iow, it’s no longer left up to police to decide whether either person is safe from violence. Either person can be removed, even the one who owns the home–usually it’s the one who seems drunk or argumentative.
ruemara
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: They’re now pushing anti-gay, anti-signing the civil rights bill dem, Marcia Fudge. Just no.
Roger Moore
@Duane:
Wolves are quite nasty, but their domesticated descendants are popular pets.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Roger Moore: Yes, but Rocky got religion from Gideon’s Bible.
RAM
We had a great old Northern Spy apple tree in our backyard, and every fall our resident woodchuck would get pretty tipsy on eating fermented windfalls. Drunk woodchucks are basically hilarious.
Gelfling 545
I’ve dealt with drunken birds from fermented elderberries and cats high on catmint but the local racooms seem, as a whole,to be relatively sober.
lamh36
ETA: So not his wife…another woman?
https://twitter.com/passantino/status/1062856614657515520
Mnemosyne
@ruemara:
Twitter bots are pushing Barbara Lee, but there’s one problem — Lee doesn’t want it and is running for a different job.
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/11/barbara-lee-on-iraq-poverty-and-a-seat-at-the-table.html
Barbara
@lamh36: I think TMZ should get ready to write a really big check to Mr. Avenatti. Damages are presumed when you falsely state that someone has been accused of a crime.
Jay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Actually they want “new”, that’s their only reason.
And they claim they won’t have a cantidate until after Pelosi is “defeated” because people are too scared to run against Nancy.
Barbara
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: And with no replacement having been identified.
Barbara
@Jay: Okay, if your substitute is “too scared” to run against Pelosi then they are by definition “not qualified” for the job. God almighty, what a bunch of spineless idiots.
Aleta
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: “Dems did not accomplish what we wanted them to; therefore Pelosi is ineffective or incompetent.”
A Ghost To Most
@Gelfling 545:
My brother the racist used to hunt racoons there in WNY with coon hounds. One night he had to wade into a pond to pull a racoon off a dog that the coon was busy drowning. He and the dog got pretty tore up, and Jethro gave up coon hunting after that.
Do not fuck with a racoon.
lamh36
@Barbara: I mean if it wasn’t the wife, was it another woman they misidentified?
IDK…i refuse to watch or read TMZ. Levin is a Trump supporter and no better than the Enquirer
Frankensteinbeck
@lamh36:
And that’s why I waited.
Aleta
@Gelfling 545: They’re smart enough to appear sober when authorities arrive and pin the disturbance on a skunk or housecat.
Barbara
@lamh36: I loathe TMZ. I won’t watch, ever.
JPL
@Mandalay: You should write a romance novel and make sure you put one of those sexy guys on the cover. .
Jay
@Barbara:
It’s a Blue Dog attempted coup.
Nancy’s not worried.
NotMax
“Hi, my name is Rocky. And I’ve been sober for 28 days.”
“Hi, Rocky!”
sdhays
@Barbara: Maybe it was “Mikhail Avenatti”. Honest mistake! //
Roger Moore
@Frankensteinbeck:
So right now your best hope is that they declare Chapter 7?
TenguPhule
@lamh36:
And he was just re-elected as Senate Minority leader.
wonderful. //s
Aleta
@NotMax: “… So I fell back in my room, only to find Gideon’s Bible.”
Martin
Nancy is going to have the other 45 Dem members of congress from CA at her back. Nobody can win a leadership fight without the CA delegation. Someone from CA will be speaker and that’s all there is to it. Anyone telling you otherwise does not understand what happened last week.
Frankensteinbeck
@Roger Moore:
Given that I strongly believe they’ve been stealing my money out of desperation rather than greed, I suspect the process of squeezing it out of them will force them to close. I have heard from background sources that yes, the company is in financial trouble that bad, and it’s only getting worse the same way their stealing my money is only getting worse.
Roger Moore
@lamh36:
It wasn’t that wife.
sdhays
@Barbara: Yeah, if no one has the conviction to risk challenging Pelosi openly, then what are we all talking about? They’ve had years to build the relationships and influence needed to take on Pelosi, just as she built her relationships and influence to become leader years ago. They’re not just spineless, they’re LAZY.
TenguPhule
@Martin:
Republicans best chance is that nobody wins. Which is what all this recent horseshit in the media being dumped on Nancy Pelosi seems to be for.
TenguPhule
@Frankensteinbeck:
Break out the lawyers and start filing liens on personal assets of the owners. You don’t owe them anything. They’ll steal everything otherwise and leave you drifting in the wind.
A Ghost To Most
@Aleta: Too smart for an animal with opposable thumbs and a nasty set of teeth.
Elizabelle
That is a sweet little raccoon face. Will take it any day of the week, over the orange one we see too much. (Now, with yak hair.)
I want Speaker Nancy Pelosi. I hope she prevails. Because she will persist.
Mary G
Mother Jones has more information on the scam company that hired Not-Acting-Attorney-General Matt Whitaker:
A Ghost To Most
@Roger Moore:
Stormy?
Aleta
@A Ghost To Most: Those opposable thumbs. If you can manipulate your environment that well, you start to get ideas.
Martin
@Mary G: Ok, surely Whitaker was smart enough to gift one of those to Trump.
Roger Moore
@Frankensteinbeck:
TMZ may be unsavory, but it’s been confirmed by AP and LA Times that Avenatti was arrested. LAPD is refusing to give more details until after he’s been booked.
Yutsano
Cute trash panda is cute.
BTW if you have to get a hold of the IRS any time soon be a little patient. Apparently an update we had is slowing just about everything down.
A Ghost To Most
@Duane:
Words I never thought I’d read on Balloon Juice. Truly a full service blog.
TenguPhule
@A Ghost To Most:
Beware of roast woodchuck though. Chewy is an understatement.
smedley the uncertain
@Roger Moore: I think that’s a squirrel name, Boris…
Frankensteinbeck
@TenguPhule:
That is a process, and I have begun it as the SFWA instructs. Now that the book is done and I have the mindspace free, I’m not going to let this slide any further.
@Roger Moore:
The police have harassed him before. I’ll wait and see. If it’s a substantive accusation, fine, throw the book at him.
A Ghost To Most
@TenguPhule:
Yeah, no. I did have what I believe to be a rabid woodchuck come after me in MD. I ended up literally chucking firewood at it to drive it off.
opiejeanne
@Mnemosyne: And Twitter is a fucking shit show today, all the idiots lining up and yelling about Pelosi being a corporatist, etc. It’s just stupid.
Roger Moore
@smedley the uncertain:
Sir Paul McCartney begs to differ.
Mnemosyne
@Martin:
I suspect they’re trying to split the CA delegation by having Twitter clamor for Barbara Lee, but as linked above, Lee is not interested in being Speaker, and she’s not dumb enough to agree to be a figurehead for the white dudes who might want to elevate her and be the power(s) behind the throne.
It would be HILARIOUS if all of these scheming dudes got voted down and the leadership was all women, with Pelosi at the head. It won’t happen, but it would be awe-inspiring to watch the Republican tantrums.
Mnemosyne
@opiejeanne:
The ‘bots have all been programmed to clamor for Rep. Barbara Lee, who has repeatedly said she doesn’t want the job.
opiejeanne
@sdhays: Some guy on Twitter said, “Yes, I want a woman to be Speaker, just not her,” And he went on to name no one.
Where have we heard that before? Hmmm.
opiejeanne
@A Ghost To Most: My Ozark grandpa made the comment that, yes, you can eat raccoon but you’d have to be darned hungry. He lived in the backwoods of the Missouri Ozarks that still only has one paved road, and that’s the state highway. They don’t even have signs on most of the roads so navigation is interesting.
Jay
@Frankensteinbeck:
And given l’Affaire de Whol and the Reichwing’s attempts to weaponize #metoo,…………
Wait and see.
opiejeanne
@Mnemosyne: One guy named someone i’ve never heard of before. Can’t find the tweet now, I think he deleted it.
The guy who said he wanted a woman, just not Pelosi named Karen Bass. Bass is supporting Pelosi.
zhena gogolia
@Frankensteinbeck:
I think there’s something fishy about it. It might be rodent copulation.
lamh36
@Frankensteinbeck: Avenatti released a statement saying it’s not true and thanked the LAPD for being professional.
Huh…TMZ changed the story to “a woman” instead of “his wife” with no correction.
https://twitter.com/rubycramer/status/1062866935728300032
Starfish
@Major Major Major Major: Parts of this story are falling apart. First. it said that he was arrested for something involving his estranged wife. She has said that she has not seen him in months.
Some people have pointed out that a friend of Trump owns TMZ.
JimV
“I’ll be damned if that isn’t a good looking raccoon.”
That was my exact thought as the picture scrolled into view on my laptop. Mainly because it looks peaceful and open to friendship. My previous small experience with raccoons is that they tend to seem suspicious if not hostile–probably with good reason.
TenguPhule
@Frankensteinbeck: Good luck and I hope you win.
SgrAstar
@piratedan: oooh, David Brin reference! Nice.
Roger Moore
@Starfish:
It’s not just TMZ reporting it, though. Here’s a report from the LA Times that includes a quote from Avenatti confirming that he was arrested, though he naturally claims it was unjustified. So it’s beyond any reasonable doubt that he was arrested. The claim that he was abusing his wife has been refuted, and we’ll have to wait to see how the rest of it shakes out.
mainmata
@Major Major Major Major: He’s claiming that he’s being framed, FWIW. We’ll know soon enough but it wouldn’t surprise me if Trump allies had framed him.
catclub
@JimV: I thought it was the booze talking, but usually the booze is in the viewer, not the raccoon.
catclub
@opiejeanne: I thought somebody tried out having the speaker not be a member of the house.
I think it would be a hoot if they made Hillary speaker.
Tehanu
Back about 1970 the WSJ had a feature column on every day’s front page — they may still, for all I know, but I haven’t read it since then (it was a job thing). Anyway, I’ve always remembered a great story they ran about birds who got drunk every year on overripe berries, all over the South.
rekoob
@Tehanu: Although it’s behind the WSJ’s paywall, you’re thinking about the A-hed, which used to be in the center column of the front page and has now been reassigned to a less prominent place:
I miss it, but on balance, I’d rather give the Financial Times my money.
J R in WV
@Mary G:
This reminds me of a very old joke.
Two guys are walking home after a party, and stop on a small bridge to take a leak.
The first guy says “Gosh, that water is sure cold!”
The second guy says “It sure is! Deep too!”