Bear (Mace) Attack!

Most of our hikes take place in bear country. We like it that way. There are less people, which means more solitude.

We have really meant to buy some bear mace all summer. We really don't want to be eaten by a bear.

Washington has mostly black bears, but there are also some grizzly bears.

Grizzly bears live here:


From Wikipedia

And black bears live here:


From Wikipedia

So we hike often in bear ranges.

Finally, we bought some bear mace. I would recommend getting some if you are going to hike in areas with bears. This one was developed by someone who survived a grizzly bear attack and his companion had human pepper spray. Bear mace is a whole lot more potent than pepper spray. Andrew was really excited about our bear spray because it came in handy camo holsters. Classy classy. But also very useful.

From the pamphlet about the bear spray, we learned that the bear mace will dilate the bear's eyes to cause temporary blindness; will make the bear cough, choke, and feel nauseous; and will cause the mucus membranes to swell so the bear can only breathe to sustain life---basically he will pass out. It is powerful stuff.

Andrew enjoyed reading the reviews of the bear spray product. People wondered how strong it was and sprayed it in their homes and had to fumigate the place, or got it in their eyes, or (as the pamphlet told us not to) sprayed their tent or children as a bear repellent. We laughed. What idiots.

But then one day, a grizzly bear wandered into our apartment. We sprayed it. The end.


Source

Just kidding.

Andrew and I were showing his mom our new bear mace over Skype on Sunday. She was very worried about us encountering a bear, so we calmed her fears. Andrew then decided to practice taking off the safety cap.

And he dropped it.

And it sprayed on our carpet.

"It works," he said.

I would have said something quite different. Starting with "sh" and rhyming with "split".

But, Andrew is a good boy and generally doesn't sin on the Sabbath. I, however, am a different story. My roommates can testify that Sundays are the days when I said most of my inappropriate comments.

Back to the story.

We had sprayed bear mace in our apartment. I ran and opened all the windows (it was about 40F outside) and got a fan going. We started coughing like crazy. We needed to leave our apartment, but we were baking a delicious treat and couldn't leave it in the oven!

So we did what any sensible couple would do.



We wrapped our faces in scarves and Skyped my parents until our delicious treat got out of the oven.


Andrew tried his best to scrub the bear spray out of the carpet.

And then we went on a walk for an hour and half. When we got back, our apartment wasn't full of airborne bear mace. Thank goodness. Also, thank goodness there wasn't really a bear in our apartment, because then we would have bigger problems than a burned dessert. And thank goodness that the baby wasn't here yet because that would be horrible for the poor little thing.

Unfortunately, I did not go into labor from coughing and coughing.

Bear mace works. Do not try it at home.