Resort Style Living...

You have all heard about my best friend, Manda, who lives in the mountains with her husband, their baby and her brother. I wrote this post last year about her trekking buckets of water up the mountain so she could flush her toilet and boil it to drink. This story actually rivals that one, if you can believe it.

So Manda calls me Monday morning on my way into work. I was concerned because she never calls me in the morning. (I am not really what you would call a “morning person”) She tells me she has another exciting chapter to add to “Resort Style Living”, which is what we call her humble abode tucked high on that mountain. She goes on to explain that her, her husband and baby were watching a movie Sunday night and the boys fell asleep. Manda saw the motion sensor in the backyard (mountain side) and thought that one of their cats was back there wanting in. She went to the door and almost swung it open when she saw a massive black butt. There was a black BEAR on her patio!!!! She ran to wake David and by the time they came back to the door, the bear was gone. David cursed himself for leaving the trash can outside (in the mountains you have to bring your trash in) and knew that was the reason the bear was drawn to them. ("Stupid human", David said. LMAO!)

After about 5 minutes of Manda and David continuing to watch outside, the bear returned to pillage the trash for food. This is the time that bears are coming out of winter hibernation and they are hungry. The previous owners told them that around this time each year a bear would come down and eat the fruit from their trees that had fallen on the ground. They told them he had never tried to harm them or anyone that they knew of but to be careful. Manda says neither she nor David got a bad vibe from the bear. (?????) He seemed satisfied with the trash and retreated up the mountain.

Manda’s little brother has a cabin on their land as well. He has no bathroom in his cabin so he usually comes up each night to the main house to take out his contacts and brush his teeth. Manda did not want him coming up and being surprised by a huge black bear. Their phone line is set up at their house and Justin’s cabin so incoming calls ring at both. Because they are using the same phone line, Manda could not call Justin to warn him. Their phone system does, however, allow them to transfer calls to the cabin. It was 1am mountain time at this point, so it was 2am in St. Louis . Manda called her other brother who lives here in the Lou and is always out partying late. She then transferred him to the cabin to tell Justin about the bear. Of course, after all of that trouble, he was not home. She called the local bar, which is the only other option of where he could be and they did not answer. She worried all night that Justin would try to come up and get accosted by a bear.

Monday morning Justin did come up. He said the moonlight was shining on the mountain when he got home and he saw all kinds of trash so he assumed there was a bear (clever mountain folks!) so he just went to his cabin. They are in the process now of discussing building a wooden, lockable trash can to avoid this issue in the future. In the meantime, Manda and baby Oliver will be playing inside for a good little while. I asked her as we were hanging up what she thinks of “resort style living” now. She said they are fine and will get used to their new massive friend. I told her not to go making friend with him. She’s like that. I bet he has a name by week’s end.

P.S. After writing this post, I spoke to Manda. The bear has been back, even when the dogs were outside and there have been no issues. Baby Oliver has slept through both appearances so he has yet to feast his eyes on his new beastly friend. She already seems to be softening to the idea of a friendly bear!