Every evening, before dark, I take out the garbage and recycling. The litter box is cleaned every evening too. But on Sunday and Wednesday nights (the evenings before our garbage pickup) I dump the litter, scrub out the dirty litter box and prepare a fresh one, and drag the cans out to the street. The cans are along the West side of the house, in the space between my place and the next-door neighbor’s.

Its dark when I do this chore, and even though I have a dim motion-detector security light there to discourage intruders, there isn’t sufficient light there to fully illuminate the ground. I have to work in the dark, and often I step on a large pile of animal turds that some malignant beast has left in the dark. This is more than just a nuisance, I wear sandals or go barefoot a lot.

My neighbors are pretty good about cleaning up after their dogs during their morning and afternoon walks, and they don’t trespass, they stay on the street. No, this is a night visitor, and by the size of his dump I suspect it is a large beast, certainly not a cat, its probably a dog, and a big one, a shepherd or Doberman. Although there are lots of cats wandering about the hood at night, there are no dogs, certainly not a big one. I would hear them barking, or see them during my nocturnal bicycle patrols.

This is either a stray from some other neighborhood, or its not a dog at all, but some wild nocturnal beast that
haunts my development after dark. And it comes to the same space between my and my neighbor’s house every night just to leave his calling card. I don’t think its wildlife, we do have the occasional ‘coons and ‘possums, but I can recognize their scat–little pellets. No, these are truly mighty turds, epic torfuckingpedoes, and the canine smell is unmistakable. And I get a good look at them when I go out in daylight to clean them up.

Perhaps they are coyote droppings, I hear they are expanding their range into southern Florida, and they adapt well to urban environments. I also understand that they are very careful to avoid detection, and often live in crowded neighborhoods with no one the wiser. There’s plenty for them to eat, both garbage and prey, feral and domestic cats, Muscovy ducks and Nile geese live unmolested in the neighborhood.

And one of these guys has chosen to mark my territory every night, like clockwork. I have a phantom shitter.