Pepe Le Disgusting. Or, "How to Bag a Dead Skunk".

So, life being what it is, every now and then you're on your way out to the pool for a leisurely sunbathe, and a visiting friend tells you there's a dead rotting skunk on the side driveway. Par for the course.

And disgusting. 

But not something to be necessarily UNhappy about. A bickering pair of skunks moved into the crawl space under the house a couple of years ago, and I've been wishing I had the guts (and enough tomato juice on hand to fill a bath) to run them over with my car or death-clonk them with bricks, ever since. I like a skunk as much as the next person-- cute and furry and all-- but when they give the yard a daily spray for kicks or hang out by your car in the morning when you're late for work--? Not cool, skunks.

So-- dead skunk in the driveway? Win-win!  For one: That solved the lingering 24- hour skunk-stench mystery, and two: one skunk down, one to go.  Cause of death unknown, by the way... Coyote attack? Raccoon bar-type brawl? Tripped while being possum-chased? Gnawed its own leg off after a snake bite, trying to remove the poison? Because all of these Animal Friends live under or near the house as well, and an eventual territory war is inevitable. I myself engage in confrontation on the back porch now and then, usually in the form of hissing. The raccoon just looks at me like I'm stupid. (until I chuck a basketball at him, THEN he saunters off.)

simulation of my raccoon-hissing confrontation. pretty much the same form, just a different animal

Despite my cheers, though, there was the problem of actually REMOVING the dead skunk. This is the portion of this post that I like to call "Who Needs a Man?" or, more appropriately, "Forced to Become a She-Man". I'm pretty capable, but I don't always like that I have to be... whatever happened to getting to play the squealing female?

Anyhoo, I quickly figured out the best course of action and it included arming myself with disposable latex gloves and my trusty Karate-Kid bandana. A regular bandana might guard you from ordinary skunk offensive, but combined with decaying flesh, the Mr. Miyagi toss-off is key. 

Check out the harshly dramatic crime-scene lighting. Nature just knew. 

Some people might find dapple-lighting soothing, but after seeing 

an innocent skunk mauled (and overrun by flesh-eating insects), all of that changes.

I figured a metal snow shovel would be the best tool for scooping up the 

corpse in early stages of rigor mortis, and I wasn't wrong. 

Double-wrapped it in a couple of Heftys though, of course.

Had a little trouble scooping at first, it just kept sliding along the 

pavement (unlike snow). Plus I kinda wanted to puke, just a little bit. 

From laughing, that is. (I'm not THAT squeamish)

Finally, with the help of a big monkey wrench (kept outside in case I ever 

have the guts to chuck it at the local raccoon instead of a neon 

basketball), I was able to pooper-scooper it up onto the shovel.

From there, just pulled the Heftys back around the skunk, dropped the bundle into a 

third bag to create a Triple-Stink-Barrier, and voila! Pepe Le Trash.

Three walls of plastic aren't quite enough, though. Still stinky. 

If it didn't stink so much, I would have preferred to impale the body on a post in the front yard, as a sort of warning to the other skunks. Fortunately, though, olfactories force my humanity.

Bring it, skunks.