Who really knows?

I ask my roofer if the new roof will keep the raccoons away. Half joking, you know. He says, "Well, maybe you need to get somebody up there and spray some more stuff."

That is what I was thinking, wondering if he'd like to do it.

"Or," he continues, "you should spread more of that granular stuff around the yard."

"That stuff is about worthless," I say.  "Doesn't even keep the squirrels away."

Then my roofer says his older brother says, "You gotta trap the raccoon. That's the only way to get rid of him."

Didn't Rudy put a trap in my yard for a week? Yes. Didn't it fail to catch anything? Yes.  It was a stupid-looking trap, I must say.

Didn't I see the great big happy raccoon right outside my writing room window after that? Again, yes, indeed.

I don't say these things to my roofer. I just look at him. Maybe my face says something, like, "Right, I'm going to buy a trap, set it, and handle the thing after the raccoon is caught, if that ever happens. And if all that, then what?" Maybe my face says that. It could have.

Then he says, "Of course, you catch one and another one probably shows up."

Right.