Colby's "Coons"

My buddy Colby was convinced he had raccoons living in his attic. It had been like that for months. He kept complaining about relentless scratching and rustling above their bedroom and was sure there was some furry mambo going down up there. He doesn't have soffit around his house under the overhang of the roof and he was sure that some coons moved in for the winter and snuggled down in the insulation. When he first brought up the idea, it was more of a gag that we were going to go up there and smoke them out or trap them or something. But last week, he reached the breaking point and I got the call...

iPhone: *digital ring tone*
Me: "What's up, dude?"
Colby: "Do you have any .22 shells?"
Me: "WHAT?!"
Colby: "We are gonna shoot the coons!"

Yeah. Let me just say that whenever Colby and his brother Jordan are together, and asking for .22 shells, I get nervous! I didn't have any, so he said it was no big deal, they'd just go buy some! Shortly thereafter, his wife Des called and asked me to come over because she didn't trust those two with a weapon and figured I'd be a source of reason and a better shot.

By the time I got there, the action had already begun! Des was screaming on the phone and I could hear Colby and Jordan yelling in the background. I walked in the front door and the .22 was lying on the floor with scattered bullets around it and I thought maybe there'd been a murder or something! I went into the hall where the ladder was set up to the attic access, which was open. Colby and Jordan were in the back room, cursing at the "coon." Turns out it wasn't a raccoon at all, but a black bird. And it was perched on the shelf in the closet while the Western brothers, each with a tennis racket in their hands and a headlamp on their heads danced around it... It was quite the spectacle!

So there we were, staring up at the trapped bird. Jordan tried to shoo it out with the racket when the thing "attacked" again! It was pure hilarity. So we decided to strobe it with the light on my iPhone and while it was in a daze, we threw a towel over it. I reached up and had it in my hand and then I tried to adjust my grip to pull it town when the thing got loose again and "attacked" Jordan, knocking him to the ground in a flury of cuss words. (Actually, the thing flew in his general direction and he fell backward).

Strobe the Bird

We chased it into the living room where it perched on the curtain rod. Jordan tried to grab the gun for a shot, but Des thankfully stepped in to save her house from what was sure to be a bad ending. We got the bird into flight again with Jordan guarding the hall, me opening the doors in the living room and kitchen, and Colby giving chase. A few more circles of the house and some poorly placed tennis racket swings later, the bird flew out the kitchen door and into the night. My side was in stitches from laughing so hard! So awesome. Nothing like strobing a helpless bird-coon to get the blood pumping! I should develop an app for this...