Pop Goes the Polecat

The Old Man is not very fond of Pine Sol. When I was about 9, my mother woke me on a Saturday morning in early fall by sitting on my bed and saying, "Now I don't want you to be scared". Well, that is a sure-fire attention getter. She went on to tell me how a skunk had gotten in the basement.

We had an old cat named Sam. Sam pretty much did his own thing, hunting and howling, and would return home during the early morning hours, usually with a trophy of one type or another. In the bottom of our basement door, Dad had fashioned a cat door. Now it wasn't one of those whiz-bang-super-hermetically-self-sealing wonders of this day and time. It was a simple notch cut out of the lower corner of the door with a little flap of rubber. It gave Sam free reign.

During the night, a skunk had found the door and in Sam's absence, decided to investigate. When Dad went down into the basement to begin his Saturday gardening chores, what he thought was old Sam turned out to be Pepe La Pue. Pepe had taken a position behind an old wash tub that was leaning up against the wall near the back door. After a careful evaluation of the situation, Dad figured out his plan of attack. The skunk kept peeping his head out from the tub in order to reconnoiter the battlefield. Dad's plan was to take careful aim with the 20 gauge shotgun and when the Pepe peeped, he would shoot him in the head trusting that skunky would die before returning fire. So far, so good. Dad took his aim, skunk peeped, the shotgun roared and just as it did, Pepe backed out the other side of the tub and his behind took the full charge.

Within 3 minutes, my room on the second floor of the house was, like the rest of the building, uninhabitable. We hauled all of our stuff out into the yard where it stayed for 2-3 days to attempt airing out. In that day, there was no Fabreze, no Oust, no Floral Bouquet anything. There was only Air Wick......and Pine Sol. Mom scrubbed the entire basement with Pine Sol. If you want a real treat, imagine essence of skunk mixed with Pine Sol.

There were, however, some side benefits. The bullys pretty much left me alone for several weeks, teachers were reluctant to keep me after school, and we got to take a lot of rides down the highway with all the windows open.

The clothes, finally through many washings, regained respectability and everything aromatic eventually faded......except for the Pine Sol.