It's illegal to keep a coon in the house without a permit

So, the new year started with a whiskey sour with double the garnish. Double the garnish because I was making them and if I had my way all cherries would be soaked in Jim Beam.

Once again have an unopened bottle of Champaign after 12:00AM on January first.

I spent most of the day assembling a wardrobe unit and rearranging my bedroom. For the wardrobe unit, the tools required were a Phillips head screwdriver, a hammer and a power drill – all of which were sitting somewhere in the room, already. I did have to go to the basement to get the 1/16 inch drill bit.

At 2:00AM the show was over, I went to bed but I wasn’t sleeping well, I thought it might be the new location of the bed but I really don’t know. At 3:45AM I hear a scratching noise. My bedroom is at the front of the house, off the front of the house there is an enclosed porch. I’ve heard the scratching before, always early in the morning so I usually would ignore it, I always thought the noise was coming from under the porch and for the most part I’m a pretty easy going guy so if some critter wants to mess about under the porch I really don’t care. Today I cared.

I grabbed the flashlight that I keep by the tv and went to the basement and looked to where I thought the sound was coming from, the joists run parallel to the foundation where I was looking and the first joist runs just about an inch from the top of the foundation which creates a mostly enclosed ledge. I look up and see the one inch gap filled with grey fur, grey fur that isn’t usually there, I was trying to think of what it could be, it was too big for a opossum and too much solid grey for a raccoon, then the thing moved.

It moved and looked right at me. I think “Happy fucking New Year*” but I still could not make out what it was when I saw something in the corner to the left move along the top of the foundation, right by the electrical panel, out in the open basement. That one was definitely a raccoon. I took a step back and hear something rustle about over my head in a portion of the basement ceiling that’s enclosed. I think – okay boys there’s not much I can do about you tonight but can you keep the noise down a bit, I’m trying to sleep.

Hopefully it’s up from this point.

*When I told the story to my mom I changed it to "Happy New Year, Fella"