Respite for the racoon, that is…
Yes, I’m a victim of a Toronto raccoon stealing my contactless order. Yes my order of lasagne and fresh garlic bread was robbed while said raccoon looked me dead in the eye. Yes, I’mma take this L with the spare dignity I have left.
— Sharine Taylor ???? (@shharine) June 13, 2020
They have range but then some of it is to our detriment
— Sharine Taylor ???? (@shharine) June 13, 2020
At my expense though…
— Sharine Taylor ???? (@shharine) June 13, 2020
There’s a reason Toronto raccoons were once featured on BBC’s Planet Earth …their hustle recognized worldwide
— Vinnie Colaiutarine Lining (@YngWill) June 13, 2020
I have a strong feeling that raccoons are digging the huge uptick in delivered food. Our apocalypse is their utopia.
— Rizzo “6’ Back, MF” Campbell (@RizzoCampbell) June 14, 2020
The lasagna was good. The bread was better. Send more garlic bread please! pic.twitter.com/k8EICOQRGy
— ARandomRaccoon (@ARaccoonRandom) June 14, 2020
Jim, Foolish Literalist
terrifying creatures, but at this point, I’ll welcome our Raccoon Overlords
Yutsano
Heh. Trash pandas.
Had a bit of a setback today. Somehow managed to develop an ulcer. Got it sealed off right away but no real good reason for it to have shown up. Oh well. Tomorrow stuff should get back on track.
patrick II
The moment I posted this on the previous thread, this one opened up. I am not letting all of that typing go to waste.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
So, I live in a downstairs condo — apt #2. At about 10:45 p.m. the doorbell rings. Who could be calling? I go to the door and look at where the masks are usually kept. For some reason, my wife had moved them. I open the door a crack. There is a 70-year-old lady standing with a pizza — and no mask. I hadn’t ordered a pizza.
Me: What do you want?
Unmasked Old Pizza Lady: You ordered a pizza.
Me: No, I didn’t.
UOPL: Your number 2?
Me: Yes, but I didn’t order a pizza.
She looks down at her order.
UOPL: It says right here, number 2.
Me: It’s probably for my upstairs neighbor, number 3. (They sometimes have pizza delivered).
UOPL, balefully looking up the stairs and then back at me: No, number 2, it says right here.
She holds up the order for me to see the number. I can’t see it.
Me: No, really, I didn’t order a pizza. Try upstairs.
Another unhappy look up the stairway. Just then my sharp-eared upstairs neighbor opens the door.
Upstairs neighbor lady: Hey! up here!
I closed the door.
Poor old lady. It’s sad a 70-year-old is delivering pizza. I hope my neighbor came down to get it. I wish the UOPL was wearing a mask.
Yutsano
Also got an untrusted warning a few minutes ago. Anyone else get that?
Another Scott
@Yutsano: One day at a time.
Strength to you.
Cheers,
Scott.
Achrachno
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Situation requires a guard dog, preferably one that does not like lasagna.
opiejeanne
@Yutsano: What is an untrusted warning? One of those popup ads that highjacks your window?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@opiejeanne: I had one of those about a week ago here, it says “Not Secure”. It cleared up after about a hour, but I sent Site Feedback report before it cleared and WaterGirl was on the case and sent a couple of follow-up emails.
Redshift
Hah! Just yesterday a friend was telling me how she was out around midnight doing some skywatching, with her cat hanging around doing cat stuff, when suddenly he went on alert and puffed up. She peered up the sidewalk and saw something, which after a bit she realized was a raccoon walking down the sidewalk, probably making his rounds of the trash cans. He noticed the cat and he puffed up, and then ran a few feet up a telephone pole. The cat, no slouch, took this to mean the chase was on, and started to move. She knew that wouldn’t turn out well, and got up to stop him. At which point the raccoon finally noticed her, said, “Crap! You’re not supposed to be here! What are you doing out in the dark at midnight?” Then leaped off the pole and ran across the street.
David Fud
I had a racoon eat three of my chickens last week, so, I am not so forgiving as all this. Lasagna? Ok. Garlic bread? Fine. Two Dominiques and one Orpington? That is just too damned far.
SectionH
AL: Raccoon. Please fix title.
HumboldtBlue
I once witnessed a battle between two raccoons on the telephone pole in front of our building.
It was loud, it was vicious and at one point the losing raccoon who was being forced down from a perch lept from about 30 feet onto the street followed quickly by the assailant who continued the attack as they rumbled across the pavement and around the building on the corner.
In better news, The Kabs Family are absolutely wonderful to watch and that young lady is simply hilarious.
NotMax
Elbow grease + patience could churn out a racoon resistant piece of porch decor as delivery depository.
Or else opt for mostly ready to go.
;)
C Stars
Took the kids on a ramble today and saw a deer, baby rabbit, and hyuuuge blue bird, gosh, almost ostrich size , long neck, dignified black legs, and black and white stripes around its eyes.
Doug R
I have shared my story of the raccoon gang war fought underneath my suburban apartment balcony. 8 raccoons total emerged from the bushes that evening.
scav
Back yard is the usual haunt of deer, rabbits, raccoons, sometimes an otter or two, a pheasant and a blissed out ground squirrel that snuck into the garage and ate about a pound of poppy seeds. The raccoons are the ones usually involved in the gratuitous nightly flinging about of plants though: I wonder if offering them some slices of garlic bread would distract and/or appease them.
SectionH
I have mixed emotions about raccoons. Bright buggers, but FFS be careful. They will literally move in and cause havoc if you let them.
Aleta
I’d gone to Ohio for a week and my partner was in Mass. We left the cats with bowls of food in the bathroom. From there to get the cat door in the kitchen you had to go through three rooms and make some turns. On the other side of that cat door you had to make another couple of turns, going through a little connector and then through the barn to get outside. We thought the food was far enough away that it wouldn’t attract anyone. A NYC friend who has a cabin here was going to look in on the cats and use the shower and kitchen. After a week in Ohio I got a ride to NYC and spent the night with the friend, who was back in the city by then. How were the cats? I asked. Oh I never saw them. I went in your house once but I couldn’t stand it, H. left the place in such a mess. What kind of mess? Dirt and things all over the floors. The cats had eaten all that food though. (We’d left a giant bag for him to feed them.) I left right away, took the train to Mass. and we drove right home. Cats nowhere to be seen. The toilet had little raccoon footprints inside the bowl where they’d gone down in like a watering hole. Somehow they’d also dropped the lever that closes the bathroom drain, and a dripping faucet had completely filled the tub. Shampoo bottles and bars of soap were bobbing around in the muddy water. They’d dug dirt out of plant pots and mixed it with water on the floor (I don’t know why) and then cleaned themselves off or played with the bottles in the bathtub. They’d carried a basket of cat toys from the piano room and left it upright in the middle of the living room, where they removed every toy and scattered them equally around the whole room. In the kitchen they’d pulled the oven door partway open and (by their tracks) seemed to have used it as a ramp to access the shelves more easily. They’d opened tiny corners in boxes of pasta to sample but politely left most of the contents inside the boxes. One had taken the lid off a container of cocoa powder and apparently shaken it over top of himself, leaving a raccoon shaped bare spot outlined in cocoa on the shelf. The cats didn’t come home for days.
NotMax
@Aleta
Bet you got stellar reviews on Raccoon Yelp, though.
:)
Aleta
@NotMax: ??
⭐️ ⭐️ 1/2
They panned the generic soap.
?BillinGlendaleCA
A happy b-day to the Astronomy Picture of the Day website, 25 years young.
rikyrah
@Yutsano:
???
joel hanes
@Yutsano:
no real good reason for it to have shown up
What with Trump and Barr and Miller and coronavirus, it’s a wonder we don’t all have ulcers.
[dons Robes of Restoration, casts healing spell]
Salty Sam
School camping trip when my son was in third grade. Group camping site, with a row of trash cans by the parking area. Big sign warning to make sure trash can lids were secured overnight to prevent raccoon depredations. The ‘coons LOVED when groups used that site. So my son was sleepy, wanted to leave the group sing-along-round-the-campfire early for bed. We’re walking to the tent in the dark, flashlight in hand, and at some point the flashlight beam pointed out into the woods surrounding the camp site.
There were HUNDREDS of pairs of eyes out in the dark shining back at us, looked like in the cartoons, just eyes blinking in the dark. Those ‘coons were just waiting for everybody to bed down so they could visit the trash can buffet.
It freaked out my poor 8yr old son. I’m not afraid of raccoons, but it was an unnerving sight, and took me awhile to fall asleep.
frosty
I moved to Baltimore in my 20s and got an apartment in a cut up rowhouse on St. Paul St. Second floor, back, so the room at the entrance was combined living room bedroom, then a hallway towards the back with the bathroom to one side, and the back (second room) was a kitchen/dining room. It had a door out to a back porch with stairs down to a driveway/parking area.
So one evening, I’m in the front and walk back for another beer. There staring at me in the hallway is a raccoon. In downtown Baltimore! I freaked, it freaked and bolted out the back door.
In later years one of my stormwater colleagues told me “Oh yeah, storm drains are like raccoon superhighways. They can go anywhere.” Having later seen raccoon tracks while inspecting pipes and box culverts, I believe it.
joel hanes
@David Fud:
As far as I know, all mammals can taste capsaicin, but no bird can.
You might get some Dave’s Insanity Sauce and spray it where the raccoons enter. Be careful; don’t get it on your own face.
frosty
@joel hanes: OMG if you’re messing with Dave’s Insanity Sauce, wear full PPE!
NotMax
@joel hanes
“Wow, these eggs are SPICY!”
:)
HumboldtBlue
@Doug R:
This is a weird fucking place.
joel hanes
@NotMax:
Dave’s Insanity Sauce is somewhat hotter than “spicy”.
I once foolishly ingested one drop on a tortilla chip — immediately required a milkshake for survival, and my mouth didn’t really recover for hours.
For calibration: I routinely put El Yucateco habanero sauce on Mexican food.
Brachiator
@Aleta:
This all sounds like a hell of a Disney/Pixar movie.
mrmoshpotato
@SectionH: It’s the cultured way to say “raccoon” – rah-coon. :P
NotMax
TCM note.
Coming up at at 6 a.m. Eastern time is Gangway for Tomorrow, of interest mainly due to its construction as a wartime propaganda film laid out in anthology form. Cast includes Robert Ryan before he became a name to be reckoned with, and top billed exotic beauty Margo, whose real name* would never have fit on any marquee.
*María Marguerita Guadalupe Teresa Estela Bolado Castilla y O’Donnell
mdblanche
I used to live in an apartment complex by the edge of the woods. The manager was always sending out sternly worded emails to remind everyone to close the dumpster properly because someone was leaving it open and the local wildlife was getting in. One night my neighbor and I were bringing our trash out. We made sure to close the dumpster properly but as we were heading back in we heard a noise coming from behind us. We looked back to see several raccoons using their clever little brains and manual dexterity to open the dumpster and help themselves to our fresh trash!
mrmoshpotato
@HumboldtBlue: LMAO!
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
The Varmint Cong
NotMax
How to Outsmart Backyard Critters.
The idea included implying that Rush Limbaugh will drive them out is almost too good.
mrmoshpotato
WOAH! Spice-eeeeeeee! I won’t be getting any of Dave’s sauce anytime soon.
CaseyL
I love raccoons and no amount of horror stories will change that.
My cats hate them, though. I always know when there is a raccoon on the porch because Jeannie will leave my lap to go growl, spit, and hurl herself at the storm door to get at them.
Once had a momma raccoon and her babies visit my porch as I was coming home from somewhere. I opened the door to go in and all four babies followed me. They were so young their heads were too big in proportion to their bodies. They were also totally without fear. I was ready to gently herd them back out the door, but momma got there first, herding them out while giving me suspicious looks.
trollhattan
Stupid pandemic story. Ordered masks from Amazon in April; not technically from Amazon, an affiliate. They Indicate shipped May 2 from China with delivery a weekish later. Then, silence. Tracking shows nothing and they keep pushing back the delivery date, week by week through early June. I can’t cancel or ask for a refund until two days after the promised delivery date. In the meantime I order and receive masks. Yay, me.
Sunday is order 1 delivery day+2 and with no masks I so ask for and am granted a refund. This morning get an email today saying refund posted to credit card. One hour later, the masks are delivered.
That’s all, I have learned nothing but have a crapton of masks.
opiejeanne
@trollhattan:
For the past several months anything ordered from China has been difficult to get shipped out of China to the west. Companies here who manufacture stuff there are having to find a route through other countries in order to ship stuff here.
I’m still waiting on a couple to t-shirts I ordered in March. The tracking info says they were shipped in April, but it also says they were shipped in May.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan:
@opiejeanne: Didn’t Trump get us out of some international postal treaty a few months ago?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Yes he did, we withdrew from the International Postal Union in October 2019.
Chetan Murthy
@trollhattan:
That seems interestingly scammy. I’d understand “you can’t get a refund until two days after the *original* promised delivery date” but if they can just keep pushing back the delivery date, it’s …. uh …. quite a scam they have there. I’d just send ’em email letting ’em know that you got the delivery, and need a prepaid return mailer to send it back. Or, perhaps you can just give it back to the delivery driver? “Refuse delivery” ?
I had a somewhat similar experience: ordered something from a company that pretended they had a US operation, but got a notification that it was being shipped from China via “Yanwen”. Then a week later, when I saw no progress on the shipment (and asked via email about it) they said it’d been transferred o Fedex (different tracking #). That tracking # didn’t work. Then 4 weeks later (during which they claimed it was coming soon, be patient, it’s in Los Angeles), they said it’d been transferred to USPS for final delivery (another tracking #). A week later, that tracking # finally worked, and the package was delivered to a location in Jamaica, Queens. They of course claimed that it was still on its way to me (just a little longer!) I finally got fed up and disputed the charge with my credit card company. Two weeks later, voila! an unexpected package shows up, from (ding ding ding) Jamaica, Queens. It seems that they were never shipping me the package — they were shipping (probably a bunch of stuff) to their warehouse in Jamaica, Queens, and from there they shipped me my package. All in all, they played that delaying game for 6 weeks before I finally gave up on ’em.
SectionH
@mrmoshpotato:
Uh, no. I don’t care how you pronounce it, spell it the only way known so far.
Does this matter? Why does this matter? Maybe it doesn’t but I bet the fucking Supreme Court thinks words matter, never mind spelling.
SiubhanDuinne
@SectionH:
I strongly prefer the double-c spelling, but “racoon” is a perfectly acceptable variant.
Sab
“Racoon respite” however it is spelled is a weird concept. Those little guys are scary.
SectionH
@SiubhanDuinne: well, I suppose it’s basically a native animal that actual original inhabitants named, so Maybe spelling is optional
Srsly, decades ago when we hosting an Aussie guy, he wanted to see a Raccoon and a couple of other critters I don’t remember now.
We took hm to the Childrens Zoo.
It worked.
Kirk Spencer
@SectionH: Merriam-Webster says it’s acceptable. I suspect the supreme court would as well.
Jay
@Chetan Murthy:
I ordered bulk diamond blades, 12, 14 and 16 inch from our corporate supplier in Feb. The 14 inch showed up last week. This is a well known supplier,( US based), a Corporate account, and yet,………..
“Lean” supply doctrine has stripped all resiliancy out of supply chains. I have parts on order, that we just can’t get,
right now, because “they” can’t get it on a truck right now.
SectionH
@Kirk Spencer: Which edition?
Geminid
@Jay: Curious: what are you cutting?
Sab
@SectionH: I can’t even spell jackal. I want to spell it jackel. I do not know why I am so committed to that mispelling.
SectionH
@Sab: it’s not that common a word. ‘S OK.
Sab
OT music. I have a very musical granddaughter without much formal training because money. Also her halfsister, who is six, autistic, and also very musical.
What do we do for them. Stuck at home is bad for performing, but could good for music theory. Musical jackals, any advice?
Kirk Spencer
@SectionH: online current. Link is in prior post.
Just One More Canuck
@HumboldtBlue: a few weeks ago, there was a running battle lasting about three nights between two raccoons in the top branches of my neighbour’s maple tree. Each night it lasted for about a half hour – the screeching was incredible. On the third night, a third raccoon got involved – guess he settled the hash of the other two because we haven’t heard anything since
WaterGirl
@Aleta: Oh. My. God.
pluky
@Achrachno: Dog that does not like lasagna does not exist.
pluky
@Sab: Ear training, and if their up for it, transcription. To answer the question “why is this so good?”, one needs the ability to recognize structure.
Madeleine
@Sab: I’m one of the music theorists here. Off the top of my head, here’s an idea for improvising melodies. As a framework, set a single triad—do-mi/me-sol-do (1-3-5-8; with 3 making either a major or minor triad). The melody can leap between any of these to another of these. The remaining notes of the scale move only around or between the main triad notes. One expansion might be allowing a leap from sol to ti (5 to 7) if ti is followed immediately by do (1).
I hope this makes sense and that it might be fun to do.
KithKanan
@?BillinGlendaleCA: We didn’t leave the UPU last October. The UPU made concessions allowing the USPS (and other countries) to raise rates to deliver international packages starting next month, so we remained in.
Source (one of many): https://www.supplychaindive.com/news/upu-postal-rate-change/564615/
The massive international postal shipping delays from Asia to the US are because of the heavy cuts to the number of international flights (which would normally also carry mail).
Trenace Stark
Love Raccoons but I’ve had a long history with their escapades and little quirks. Always make sure to lock sliding glass doors even if you’re on a second floor. My balcony surrounded by water when the tide was in and rock when it was out. The raccoons didn’t pay attention to the tide and opened the glass door. I was asleep and woke to noises in the kitchen and it was a party. 5 visitors who liked Twinkies and leftovers from the fridge. They couldn’t leave with the tide in so they sat on the balcony until the tide went out. They returned a few times but I kept the door locked so no more late night parties with the little bandits.