While You Were Sleeping

I've been keeping an eye out night after night, hoping to see some of the critters in my yard.

I...might have cheated the other night. I put out a tiny bit of cat food in hopes of getting the raccoon to stay still long enough for a photo. It worked but I won't do it again.

This adorable creature showed up as I watched and waited, like I was on safari.

But...it wasn't just eat-and-run. It was eat-and-examine. Examine every square inch of that patio and fence. This critter (who Yancey has named "Murphy") moved SO fast, sniffing everything. Murphy zipped right over to where I was standing on the other side of the half-frosted window and sniffed the window sill, went down the steps to my back door and sniffed profusely, clambered up the bricks to the patio with her tiny prehensile-ish hands and feet, then made her way over to the fence, SCALED THE FENCE in a split second, used the top as a balance beam, and then jumped over to a tree and disappeared into the nun's yard.

Awesome but a little terrifying. Raccoons know no fear. I don't think I'll ever go out in my yard after dark again.