One night last week around 11 p.m., I opened the screen door to let the boys, my two dogs, Hunter and Malone, out for their last chance of the day break. Much to my horror, less that 18 inches away from the door on my deck was a skunk.

A frantic three seconds followed. All at the same time, I yelled at Hunter and Malone to get back inside, bent down to catch my dog that wasn't listening, my two cats ran past the skunk through Hunter's legs, the skunk turned and raised his tail and Malone slipped through my fingers.

I managed  to push Hunter back into the sunroom, but that little Malone, the beggar ran right through my hands.

Malone got it dead on in the eyes, open mouth, over his face, chest and legs and I got it on my hands and forearms and of course I had on my new top, the expensive one that I just bought for job interviews. The top got spray on the sleeves.

While Malone was rubbing his face in the grass, the skunk and I squared off. He glared at me and dared me to come outside. Neither one of looked like we were going to back down, both of us staring into each other's eyes without blinking. I am pretty sure he had one eyebrow raised.

I finally backed down, went inside and got a water spray bottle, went back to the door, told him to go home and sprayed him with water. He finally slowly moved along though it was quite the dirty look I got from him. I went back into the house, ran the tub water and went outside to get Malone.

That is one cheeky skunk.

Malone was frantic and really smelly. I clipped his leash onto him and put him into the tub. I climbed in with him in my undies and spent a  lot to time over and over soaping and rinsing him with tearless puppy shampoo.  Bath time is not his favourite and he normally tries to squirm out of it, but this time he just stood there, trembling, seeming to understand that I was helping to get the stinky sting away from him.

I went to school yesterday but got sent home immediately as I was not as savvy as I thought about getting out the odour. Back into the shower, fresh new clothes and back to school. Right home again. Damn. Back to the laundry room and back to shampooing Malone.

Day two now, I have tried the deskunk spray and doggy shampoo from the vet, with great success and now today I am going to try a sponge bath with one part apple cider vinegar and two parts water. Everything that is fabric that Malone and I went near is wrapped in garbage bags and will be washed again tonight with a mixture Orange aPeel, apple cider vinegar, dish soap, disinfectant, laundry soap and Borax. Then comes the shampooing of chesterfield and two chairs. I don't have a machine so I will have to do it by hand and then use my industrial vacuum cleaner to remove the residue. After that, the deck scrub down.

I know about the tomato juice idea, but I just can't seem to get over how revolting tomato juice and skunk oil would smell.

Although it works to remove the odour I do not recommend using a doggy shampoo for normal showering for humans. It doesn't have a great fragrance, kind of smells like hospital floor cleaner, and leaves your skin rather dry and itchy. Plus it is really expensive.

I don't want to offend anyone at school today, though after their reactions I will counter with how they stink after their endless cigarette breaks.  So today at home I am working on sending out resumes. By the end of the day, all will be back to normal.

By the way, I think the manufacturer should change the label of the skunk shampoo. I doubt anyone would want to catch a skunk and try to shampoo it. I know I won't try it.