Running a business is full of surprises, crisis, drama, and a fair set of adventure. However, a couple of weeks ago I got a call from one of our employees, Eric, and the conversation went something like this:
Raccoons in the House!
Eric: Oh my, God! There’s a bear in our office.
Short interlude here. Eric is a born and raised Chicagoan. He does love his country music, he’s a great guy, and he’s awesome at fixing broken iPhones, but a zoologist he is not.
Matt: I doubt it’s a bear. What’s it look like?
Eric: It’s furry, the size of a small dog, and has some stripes on it.
Matt: It’s a raccoon.
Short interlude #2. I was born and raised about 7 miles outside a town of 4000 people, my high school graduation had 89 participants, and most of my nearest neighbors were raccoons.
Eric: What do I do? I’ve got a hockey stick in my truck. I could poke it.
Matt: That’s a bad idea. How about I call the landlord and have him take care of it?
Eric: That sounds like a better plan.
Without going into all the gory details, there were about 6 phone calls back and forth with the landlord and Eric and eventually the raccoon was removed from the premises. In reality, it turned out to be 3 raccoons that had to be removed.
“How,” you may be wondering, “did 3 raccoons get into your office?”
Excellent question! The answer is they climbed a tree outside the building that had branches that leaned over our building. They climbed out on one of those branches, jumped on the roof, and burrowed their way through the ceiling. Once inside, they commenced having a raccoon rave complete with tearing apart the blinds, ripping up some of our accessories, knocking the printer off the table and breaking it, and leaving a pretty horrendous mess in their wake.
After a couple hours of cleaning by Eric and the landlord, we had just about everything back to normal and we were even able to get the printer working again. So all-in-all, not too horrible of an experience – just not one I ever thought I’d be blogging about.
That conversation is pretty accurate. I am not a zoologist, however, I now know the difference between a bear and raccoon. YES!
A bear the size of a dog lmao!!!!!
Rumor has it, it was over a 40 pound raccoon. Apparently it had been frequenting the Wendy’s dumpster across the street after it’s late night office partying.