Groundhog Day!

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Last Wednesday evening, we had a terrible rain storm and our power went out for five hours. During this blackout, we noticed water pouring in from our basement window and the window well filling with water. We actually had about 12 inches of water that we could see, almost like a porthole in a ship, just rising and rising in that window well and several frogs swimming on top. My husband was out in the storm bailing frogs and water most of the evening. He said he would fix everything this week.

Jump to this week...we woke up to another bad storm and I asked my daughter to go check the window. She came upstairs and said there wasn't any water in the window area, but there appeared to be a BEAVER trapped in the window well. At 6:30 am, these are not the words you want to hear. Sure enough, I go downstairs and there is an animal staring back at me through the window, that does have four front buck teeth, but a furry tail. Of course, I got on the phone to my husband (who is never home when these things happen) and told him (ok, I yelled) that I really wished he had covered that area like he said he was going to do. He said it was not a beaver, but a ground hog, and just kept laughing that we thought it was a beaver.

All day, I tried to get the ground hog out. I put two large branches down there thinking he would just crawl up and be on his way. Nope. Next, I tried a board with a peanut butter path and again no luck. Meanwhile, the ground hog is chewing all three things like he is building a dam in that well and relaxing in between all the chewing. Chewing, pooping, and relaxing....he seemed like he was starting to like the accommodations. I had to leave to volunteer and called my husband again to tell him our friend was still there, could he think of something, and hopefully, get him to leave by the time I came back. Do you know what he said then...."I don't think you should let the dogs near the groundhog" and seemed surprised when I said, "Well, then in that case I have to cancel the play date I scheduled at 3. Hold on, while I go tell the ground hog." Hey, sarcasm gets me through sometimes, what can I say.

Anyway, I came home at 8:00 pm and you got it, the ground hog was still there. Apparently, what my husband thought would be a good plan to rid our house of the ground hog included him working out, reading his Bike magazine, and having a snack. Oddly, none of those things made the ground hog leave. He did say he tapped on the window a couple of times. Next, he said he would deal with it when he got off work today and I quickly explained that the poor ground hog was getting out of that hole asap. So, Plan B was concocted in the garage by him as he looked around to see what could be used for ground hog removal. Did I mention he is an engineer? Out he comes with a cross country ski and tried to place it under the ground hog and expected the animal to balance on it while he lifted it up and out. I was dumbfounded that it didn't work...it seemed like such a sure thing. Finally, he got a bucket, managed to push it into the bucket and was able to hoist that up and now our friend is free. The last words I told him last night were, "somewhere out there is a little ground hog that thinks you are a hero!" Oh, and the cover is now soundly in place.

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Carol, Luckily, he has not been back to visit :) My DH will never live it down. It even made my Christmas letter.

[Carol and Banjo]

OMG Laurie...How in the world did I MISS THIS!!??  After seeing reference to it today I went back to look...and I'm so glad I did....I'm dying from laughing!  You kill me!  This beaver groundhog could not have found a better place to spend the day.  He's now infamous!

[akselsmom]

I am SURE he saw his shadow because the winter weather has come with a vengeance in Alabama. Since we normally don't drive in it, we don't know how! 80 to 90 accidents in Birmingham and not even 5 o'clock traffic, and by the time I crossed the monster overpass, 4 hours later, my battery died. And I live 20 minutes from work! Grrrrrr!

[Becky, Savannah, & Raleigh]

This is hilarious! I am rolling, how did i miss this post! lol, i am picturing it now..you should have sent Vern down there..he would have had him running for the hills (or maybe that would have solved the cat chasing problem!)

[Maryann,Roo and Tigger]

LOL It sounds so familiar, the husband part, not the groundhog. My husband travels a lot and I have a sign that says "Murphy's Corollary - If something is going to go wrong, it will go wrong when Mr. Murphy is out of town."

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Indiana is my home state and everyone thinks all we have there are farms and lots of corn. I was a city girl and no farms (or cornfields) were near where we lived. Now, I live in PA, in the country, right next to a large corn field. Go figure. When we first moved here, I could not get used to how dark it got at night without street lights, and my husband did not help by saying "beware of the Children of the Corn". Those engineers really know how to crack you up.

[Linda and Murphy]

Congrats to your daughter! I made the 15 hr drive to Purdue with him (just being a mom...I know). I don't know what I thought was in Illinois and Indiana but it wasn't corn! I kept thinking about "Children of the Corn". lol

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Linda, I forgot to say my daughter just got her PhD in Special Education at Purdue University in July and her new husband went there too. We all love Drew Brees in our family :) Small world sometimes.

[Linda and Murphy]

Laurie, Thanks for this hilarious post. Jordan is also a ChemE (2009 grad). He went to Purdue with his Saints hat and I was a little concerned. BUT, thanks to Drew Brees, there are a lot of Saints fans. I love all the engineer humor.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

ROFL, Nancy!