Sometimes You Just Know

It's true.

Sometimes, you can just tell that a call is going to be an adventure:

"DOA ground hog -Back of building, stuck in pipe."

Oh goodness...

I arrive at the back of a small apartment building and find that where the parking lot ends there is a retaining wall down about a foot to the sloping grassy back area. Sticking out of this wall... is a ground hog. You see, there's a drain pipe that went under the parking lot and exited at this wall. There is, however, a small pipe that crosses the larger hole to, as I understand, try and keep animals out.... evidentially quite unsuccessfully mind you.

Something like this:
Anyway, see that little spot between the bar and the bottom of the pipe? That is where the stupid little stinker wedged his head in and died.

An incredibly nice older woman who made the call greeted me, soon followed by the building's superintendent and another building resident. Again, surprised to see me as the one showing up to remedy this situation, we joked about getting paid the 'big bucks' for my job... aka. min wage.

Gloves? -check
Garbage bag? -check
Vicks? (for the smell) -check
Man-Pants? -check

Getting hold of the little guy's shoulders, I give a tug.... zero movement.
<crowd gasps>

Tugging harder, trying to shimmy him out for a few minutes, I make little leeway. The superintendent suggests I lose the garbage bag and just grab him with the gloves for more traction... I say he's more than welcome to give that method a try if he'd like, yet surprisingly he declines.

We laugh and chat, mostly about how I'm supposed to be an elementary school teacher,as the peanut gallery grows slightly. Eventually the older woman needs to catch the bus to work, but sadly comments that she wishes she could see how it all ends... luckily for her the superintendent offers to drive her to work. (New thought: charging admission?)

Progress is slow. Shimmying only works so well... I'm not going to lie, bits of his scalp were coming off... how he got in there in the first place is beyond me. I eventually reach in and try to push him out... meaning I find myself reaching into a hole to push on a dead, bloated ground hog's face in order to unwedge it from being stuck in a pipe.

Seriously, I have no idea how either the ground hog or myself got into that situation.

Yet I can't deny that my day provides me with very unique accomplishments.

After 30-45 minutes of pushing and tugging on the little bugger, when he finally came lose I, along with my newly formed fan club, cheered.

...Oddly enough, thinking this would be the end of my 'interesting' calls for the day, I went directly from this to a woman with a dead goose... stuck on top of her gazebo.

"Yea... I don't really know how you're going to get it off of there"
"Neither do I... but it's gotta be easier than the ground hog I just dealt with..."