The "Disturbing the Harmony" Story

It was an ordinary day. Now for many of you, this story may not sound ordinary, but for LDub's household, take it from me, it's ordinary. Now, a little bit of background info is needed before I give you the punchline, so here goes ..... Ever since we moved to the "Beach House" 15 years ago we have been greeted weekly, sometimes daily, by uninvited guests that show up at our back door. Four-legged guests. We have the usual squirrels and chipmunks as well as having the usual stray cat, even a dog now and again, but we also have had a variety of more "wildlife" visitors. A groundhog shows up a few times a month. I believe he lives under my neighbors porch, since that is where I have often seen him while mowing the grass in the summer. It appears to be different sizes from year to year which makes me think it is more than one. Often wondered what they did holed up for the entire winter in that hole. Year-round we have a few possums that visit after dark. They make quite a bit of noise as they try to eat out of the glass bowls on the back deck. Have a hard time getting their nose to the bottom, so they dish it out of the bowl with their nose onto the wood planks, then eat it. Wondering what we are doing with glass bowls on our deck? Well, Carol and I are both animal lovers and we don't have the heart to let them go hungry so I buy big bags of the cheapest cat food I can find and we fill the bowls with that. At least it keeps them away from the neighbors' houses, but not from meeting their death on the streets when some drivers won't swerve to miss them. We also have a raccoon or two that will stare in the rear door and watch what we are doing while eating. If we walk to the door and turn the rear light on, they still just look at us as they chew the food. And lastly, we have the skunk family. We have noticed them off and on for the last few years, but last summer mom skunk brought her three young ones to eat one evening. What a racket they made. We were sitting, watching TV, when Carol said, "Must be the possum." It was a moonlit evening and as we snuck to the door Carol said, "It's a baby skunk! And there's another! Wait, there's another one, also. And .... here comes the mom." Yep, 3 of the cutest furry balls you have ever seen. Each one differently marked. White stripes on black, black stripes on white and almost all black with a white bob on the tail and a white head. They ate for maybe two or three minutes then started jumping on each other, falling off the steps and jumping back up again to jump on the back of another one. As soon as mom saw us she hustled them off. Now, I think I have given you all the background info you need. Here's where the story begins: Went to bed last night about 11:00 PM. Tired from a full day at work and knew I would be able to sleep well. Took about a minute or two and I was unconscious. Was having a really great dream and at the end (maybe might not have ended if not for the following) I was overcome with this strange odor. I awoke in my dream, no that should be I awoke from my dream finding it hard to breath. Looked at the clock; it read 6:07 AM. Geez, the smell was terrible!! Just then Carol started to stir. "You smell that?" I asked her. "Are you kidding?" was the response. I actually looked around the room to see where the skunk was. I have never been sprayed, but this was about as close to getting it as you can without the actual moisture on you. I asked her if I should get the masks out of the closet to wear. Negative response. I just had to get up and turn on the overhead fan which seemed to help, but now was spreading it all through the house. My guess was that we had a visitor about 10 to 15 minutes ago who was spooked by another guest and left it fly. Right outside our bedroom window which is directly above the bowl of cat food. Now this has happened at least 3 or 4 times before, getting kind of ordinary, but not as bad as this. I drove to work at the gallery today knowing that I must smell terrible, but not to worry, because my boss doesn't have the scent of smell. After work, entering the car, it hit me full force. See, the garage is right next to the family room which is right next to the door where the bowl of cat food sits. Oh, well. Suburban living at it's finest. As I sit here typing, I have the air sanitizer running full force in the family room with 4 Glade plug-in air fresheners going and the exhaust fan on in the kitchen. Was going to open the back door, but it's already 65 degrees in here and my hands will freeze if it's any colder. It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.