Long Way Up

Just before dark on Tuesday evening, an Amish buggy pulled in our driveway.  It was three teenage Amish boys (For those of you who might know them, it was Andy, Mose, and a friend.) who wanted to know if they could try their hand at trapping pigeons in our old silo.  (The boys trap the pigeons and sell them live to a guy who uses them to train hunting dogs.  He will pay them $2-3 per bird, but they have to have at least 100 of them.)  Derek headed out to the silo with them to see if there were any pigeons around. Instead of a silo full of pigeons, they saw feathers, and a raccoon crawling around the ledge at the top of the silo.  So, this is the part of the story where you're going to miss out on all of the details (because I wasn't there), so if you want more details you'll have to ask Derek.  What I know for sure is, just a few minutes later Derek came back to the house with a HUGE smile on his face and told me, "I got him."  He had shot at the raccoon on the top of the silo, from the ground, and killed it.  He left it lying in the exact spot where it landed so that he could show me the next day.  And also so that I could take a picture of him with it; he was so proud.