Skunks R Us

I know I've been gone for a long time. To be honest, I've thought multiple times about shutting the ol' blog down. I guess I will make that decision another day. Now onto my story...

I am a sniffer. I smell scents and go crazy trying to figure out what they are and where they come from. For example- I almost never miss a dirty diaper the moment J makes it and I can smell if HB ate onions or drank a beer the moment he walks through the door. My super sniff drives HB crazy! (Probably because I'm always like, "what is that smell?")

Last Wednesday night HB and I left the garage door open all night. Our neighbor Keg (Is that what I called him previously? It's been so long I can't remember.) texted us both and called HB to let us know. Of course that was at 10:30 and we were both asleep so the door was wide open all night long.

HB left for Arkansas on Thursday leaving J and I to hold down the fort. Thursday night was uneventful. Friday my in laws watched J overnight so I was by myself. I woke up around 12:30 am Saturday morning and smelled an awful smell. It was most definitely a skunk. We have new neighbors to the right of us and they have dogs. My middle of the night brain figures the dogs saw a skunk, scared it and the skunk sprayed, no biggie. When I left the house on Saturday morning I could still smell the skunk in the garage, but not in house.

Fast forward to Tuesday morning at 12:30 am HB and I both awoke to the stench of a skunk. It was awful! Tuesday when I came home from work I still smelled the skunk. I called HB at work (side note- he loves getting calls at work about problems at the house) and told him about the smell. He called our pest control people, but they don't deal with skunks. HB figured the skunk got in the garage the night we left the door open and now wants to make under our house a home to raise her little ones. (FYI- January is mating season for skunks and February is when they have their babies.)

A guy at HB's work knew of someone who would come over and check out the situation for us for a nominal fee. (I'm not even going to tell you how much this cost.) He set skunk traps and said if we found a skunk in any of the traps we are to call him ASAP for him to remove it. How classy is it that I now have a black garbage bag covered skunk trap in my garage? And there are peanuts leading into it.

If you smell a skunk after HB, J or I walk into the room, please tell us. I am afraid it has gotten into our clothing and even though I can't smell it I would DIE if I was assaulting your sniffer. (And yes, I am so lazy that I don't want to wash all of our clothing or fumigate our house unless it is needed.)

What I will take from this experience:
1. Don't leave the garage door open.

2. I know the ins and outs of skunk mating and having babies.

3. If you remove a skunk from your home, you have to cover the cage so the skunk is in darkness and take it 15 miles away from your house to release it. If you don't go 15 miles it will find it's way back to your home.

4. The easiest way to make sure the skunk won't come back is to drown it.

Does this sound a lot like the Groundhog Problem we had a year and a half ago?