Josie May

GOOD NEWS: another healthy addition to the Aho clan has arrived!

Josie May Aho was born early Tuesday morning to Merritt and Stacie in Phoenix. She is perfectly healthy and adorable. I can't wait to meet her! Congratulations guys!

Urban Jungle?

SITUATION: Out my front door, up seven stairs, ten feet down the sidewalk, where the untamed wilderness of the Provo River meets the slightly more civilized world of the Branbury live a legion of raccoons (I would say family, but who am I to assume their relation? Or tribe, but that just seems to conjure up some sort of politically incorrect connotations involving Native Americans).

ORIGIN: These furry little friends (or foes. . . this has yet to be determined) first appeared a couple of months ago. The common consensus seems to be that they were originally attracted by the cat food that some well-intentioned individual started putting out to support the growing number of stray cats also wandering the area. The unintentional result seems to have been the creation of a feeding ground for any and all scavenging animals.

ENCOUNTERS: I will admit that when my roommate Heather first described the raccoons I thought she might be lying, or at least that the animal in question could have been a particularly large model of the aforementioned cats, plumped up by the free food. After my other two roommates and at least three neighbors described similar sightings however, their existence became undeniable. By far the most eventful encounter was Heather's recent. . . experience. For some reason I still haven't quite pinned down Heather was delivering brownies to some boy at two in the morning. While returning to our apartment and text messaging, she heard a hissing in front of her. Quickly pocketing the phone Heather looked up to see one of our furry masked friends poised in the middle of the sidewalk, teeth bearing, hissing (Heather has re-enacted the event for me in the very same spot so as to ensure accurate reporting--though she found recreating the proper hissing noise somewhat difficult). At this point she ran. Taking shelter one stairwell over she watched anxiously for an opening. After a couple of minutes the raccoon retreated a bit towards the riverbed and Heather took the opportunity to sprint to the door and get inside. Fearless and curious as she is, she apparently came back out to observe the raccoon, who, upon seeing her again re-commenced hissing and began approaching her. After slamming the door, Heather spent the next couple of minutes watching through the blinds as the raccoon descended the stairs and sat in front of our door, staring. Now I'm not trying to be paranoid, but I think there might be something up here, are we being stalked by raccoons?

FACTS: According to a disturbing account on This American Life (a public radio show), rabid raccoons are likely to attack and are almost impossible to kill (think 50 bludgeons with a tire iron and five gunshots--two separate accounts). Also, apparently they can pick complicated locks and remember them for up to six years--it says so on Wikipedia which anyone can edit so you know you're getting the best information out there (thank you Michael Scott).

SUGGESTIONS: This is the part where you say something.