Skunked

Jean and I were awaken several nights by the intense smell of of this nocturnal neighbor. When we mentioned the animal to the kids both Juli and Stevie relayed stories of waking late at night and seeing this animal in the yard just outside their window. This year being rather warm we have had fans in the windows to cool the house. But after the third night of being "skunked" we knew something had to be done. The trouble was,what to do with a spray happy stinker that as it turns out was living right under the front porch? The kids and I ruminated over this odiferous issue one morning and finally decided that if we did not want to have it living here we needed to take drastic measures. So I purchased a "have a heart trap". But as I was setting it under the porch it occured to me that once caught the skunk would have it's revenge when I crawled back under to pull it out. Not wanting to offend every living thing arround me for the next 8 weeks I opted for plan B. Our solution, while heavy handed as it seems, turned out to be the simplist and most effective. We took our extra chain link fence. Then layed it over the holes and bare earth under the porch and paved over this with two courses of old brick we had from tearing down the chimneys. "Voila" We waited. Night one-no smell. Night two again no smell. Nights three- seven not even a whiff. Life is spinning in greased grooves again.