Otto's collection

We're all weary of the raccoon problem around here, whereby they continue to enter our house through the cat door. It's been going on for a long time, assisted by my nutty neighbor who continues to nurture their expectation that people feed them all the time.

It's gross.

For a long while I simply locked the cat door, but we've grown weary of manually opening the door for our active cats.

So I installed a magnetic cat flap door which hypothetically works by only unlocking when my cats enter the door wearing special magnetic collars.

Well, of course it doesn't work, but I've kept the magnetic collar on Otto because he is handily collecting all of the dangerous, tetanus-laden items from around the backyard, and delivering them back to me for disposal.

It really is handy. I've gotten numerous rusty nails and staples because Otto has reported home with these objects attached to his collar. He currently has a couple skanky BB's attached to his collar magnet, and I just need to pin him down and throw them away.

In a few months, Baby V will be mobile, and looking for new and interesting things to put in her mouth. Thank goodness for Otto's efforts, clearing the space of rusty metal junk. Now if we could collect the potentially lethal mushrooms from beneath the play structure, we'd be all set.