Damn Snucks

Monday, the highlights: Bridgey is running around super excited that she gets an "extra home day" because, even though she seemed totally fine, we *think* had a fever the night before (could have also been operator error on the new ear thermometer) and was coughing and up a lot so we decide to keep her home anyway; Tim is trying to beat the breakfast deadline at school with Shane since we all woke up pretty late due to aforementioned 3 year old up a lot; and the dogs are freaking out ready to eat and go out.

Tim and Shane finally get out the door and I feed the dogs and let them out while starting to retreat upstairs to finish getting ready when I hear a louder than usual commotion outside, and that's saying something. I yell to Bridget to open and let them in and shortly after she tells me she needs help. Strange, I think, but go down only to be greeted with a terrible smell in the kitchen - a terrible, unmistakable smell of.... skunk... SKUNK - Seriously!!?? SKUNK IN MY BACKYARD ??#$%@#%??!!!

Bridget says her usual bad smell line of, "Ewwwie, I smell something stinkkkkkkkyyyyyyyyy". Freaked out I go out on the deck to barely see a puff of black scurrying (I guess they scurry, right?) under my neighbor's fence. I can't even write what was going through my head or what I might or might not have said outloud as I prayed the dogs didn't actually get - bleechh - sprayed. Thankfully, somehow they didn't (although they didn't smell great) and I quickly brought them in, closed the door. Case closed, right? Dodged a stinky bullet there, didn't we? Well, except... except for the fact I have a three year old. A VERY inquisitive three year old who spent her entire home day asking the following OVER AND OVER AND OVER:

"Mommy, mommy, what is a SNUCK?"
"How did that snuck get there?"
"Where is that snuck's mommy?"
"Did the snuck go home?"
"Did Riley and Brogan eat the snuck?"
"Is the snuck going to eat Riley and Brogan?"
"Why is the snuck stinky?"
"Is it because he ate something bad?"
"Where does he live?"
"Is the snuck going to get in our house?"

Funny for us, at some point, she progressed to yelling at the snuck:

"GET OUT OF HERE SNUCK"
me -yeah, get out of here snuck

"RILEY AND BROGAN ARE GOING TO GET YOU"
me - that's not nice, we don't want the boys to get any animals

"I DON'T LIKE SNUCKS" me - why? snucks are nice, SUPER NICE in fact

"MOMMY THE SNUCK IS BACK - IT'S BAAAAAAAAAAAACK"
this was not true, but did send me running to the back door and then opened a dialogue about telling the truth to mommy

"THAT SNUCK IS GONNA GET ME" me-no it's not, bridgey, again snucks are actually very nice animals, sweet, adorable in fact, they wouldn't hurt a fly...

Finally, eventually, for Tim's sanity (since he mostly stayed home with her that day) she went back to playing with toys and not talking about the "snuck" anymore. Whew, case FINALLY closed? Weeeeeellllllllll, except for that other little problem of a 3 year old's memory....

Me: "Night night babygirl, I love you, see you in the morning..."
Bridget: "Night night, Mommy. Mommy, I can't close my eyes tonight.
(she always says this, btw)
Me: "Yes, you can, just lay here and watch your fishies and think happy thoughts...."
Bridget: No, mommy, I really can't tonight...the snuck is going to get me..."