This morning we noticed the cat's water bowl on the back deck was full of dirt. This usually means that a raccoon has been by.

We have cams on the front and back door. Checked the footage. At 11.40 pm Stanley the neighborhood cat was asleep on our front porch. Suddenly he woke, sat up on high alert and began peering at something. Then he got up and left.

He walked up onto the back deck a few moments later and took up a position by the back door. Within a minute a big raccoon, easily three times Stanley's size, came up the steps. Found Stanley's water bowl, washed his li'l raccoon hands in it as they always do. Then he started accross the deck toward the back door. Stanley rose up and hissed. Raccoon backed away, went back down the steps.

Stanley waited a minute, then walked back up the driveway and round to the front porch and went back to sleep on the chair we leave out for him.

Stanley's a remarkable cat in many ways. He's not even ours, we just accommodate him because, like everyone on our block, we think the world of him.