Raccoons: Wash Now, Mud Later

The Raccoon Spa Experience (Now With Extra Mud!)

by Someone Who Regrets Watching This Without Popcorn

 

Let’s talk about raccoons. Specifically, the ones in my photo, who have clearly been attending etiquette classes taught by a feral Martha Stewart.

 

There’s Mom Raccoon, ever the example, leading her kits to a muddy buffet like a maître d’ in a wet fur coat. They slop, they stomp, they taste-test everything in reach—including, I suspect, the concept of dignity. And just when you think they can’t possibly look more like disaster mascots, they wade into deeper water and start…bathing.

 

Yes. Bathing.

 

These are wild animals. They live in mud, sleep in trees, and have been known to hiss at toasters. But suddenly they’re scrubbing their little jazz-hands like surgeons prepping for raccoon heart surgery. One was even flossing with pond scum.

 

For about twelve seconds, they looked majestic. Clean. Poised. Possibly ready to open a raccoon-run juice bar.

 

And then… they turned around.

 

They walked straight back into the same gunk they just washed off. No hesitation. No regret. Just: squish, squelch, whee!

 

It’s as if their entire hygiene philosophy is:

 

1. Clean self

2. Immediately ruin that

3. Repeat until bedtime or rabies

 

I asked a friend—let’s call him Alfred—why they do this. He said, “The raccoons take a bath to get cleaned up, only to walk into mud and get all mucked up.”

 

Which is either a profound metaphor for modern life or proof that raccoons are just winging it like the rest of us.

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Done