Texas Wildlife

Before I moved to Texas, the only critters I ever worried about, or saw for that matter, were spiders. Every now and then, I would have one in the house. I would suck 'em up with the vacuum. Now I live in a city where pest control companies thrive. Critters are everywhere, and they're big. Definitely won't fit up my vacuum tube. I think that the cockroach is the Texas state bird. Two nights ago, we all peeked through the blinds and watched a SKUNK forage in the building materials across the street.

Within the first month that we lived here, we had to call critter control. They set traps up in the attic. We waited. Then it smelled....bad. Critter control man showed up with a flashlight and gloves. I escorted him to the attic. Just before ascending, he turns to me and asks, "do you know what it is I am looking for?" Huh? I just stared at him for a moment while I thought, "Are you kidding me?! Like, what are my options...a mountain goat!?" He stopped waiting for a response and disappeared into the attic. Ten minutes later he came back down with a rat the size of Vermont in a plastic bag. The smell only took a day to fade away.

Last Sunday, my friend Shannon called to ask us how good of friends we were. Todd told her, "pretty good I guess, because we've stopped interviewing." Shannon then asks, "are we good enough friends that you would help us remove a possum from our bathtub?" Todd almost peed his pants from laughter.

Shannon's upstairs bathroom had a crack in the ceiling and the kids had been complaining that they could hear something running in the ceiling. The crack gave way and a possum fell through the ceiling into her bathtub! Let me just repeat for emphasis.....A-POSSUM-FELL-THROUGH-HER-CEILING!


We skittered over mighty quick because, come on, how often do you get to see this? Being the good friends that we are, we brought a bin and a cutting board to contain the critter. Todd commented that he didn't know possum had so many teeth. Texas has big rodents. I'm definitely going to have to get a bigger vacuum tube.