A small--but to me not insignificant--coincidence occurred.

We went to a BBQ at a friends abode--that was the fantastic bit.

One point of the evening--whilst walking about the vast estate we happened upon a hole.

I, being of the curious sort, happened to look in the hole.

Not much surprised, I saw what I took to be a deceased furry critter at the bottom of the hole (the hole being about 2-3 feet deep)

So my friend and I start talking about other things and were about to walk away. I cast one last look down the hole with a thought of sad passing for poor small furry critters when I noticed that the furry critter moved!

It wasn't dead yet.

Well now this is a whole other kettle of fish.

At this point in the story I should mention that the jury was still out on what part of the animal kingdom this critter derived from. I mean, up until now it was dead so what did it matter.

Now, however, that it was moving, knowing what the critter was would go far in the 'how to remove said critter safely' endeavour that we were about to partake. I mean, getting a muskrat out of the hole would involve somewhat more, shall we say, lengthy protective procedures than if it was a stray cat.

See, we couldn't discern what the critter was because it was pretty much caked in mud--the hole had a very muddy bottom and it looked as if the critter, in it's continuing endeavours to get extradite itself from the hole, made itself into a muddy mess.

My best guess, from seeing what I could, with the button nose, the black hair (that I saw under the mud) and the tapered snout, was that this critter was a baby skunk. That was my best guess. A possum would've been another guess but I've never seen a black possum. But it definitely wasn't a rat.

So with a little fuss of trying various things--sticks, shovels, whatever was lying around the yard--I ended up just asking for a pair of work gloves and stuck my arm down the hole.

Turns out that it was a little more difficult than that--the critter (which I presumed to be a baby skunk) had his 4 paws and his belly stuck in the now drying mud. Trying to get my hand under the critter whilst not trying to harm it was a little difficult.

The good (and sad) bit was that the creature was very weak and made no fuss at all when my hand came to get it.

With a little coaxing and pulling, I managed to pull the critter out of the hole.

So now I'm holding it in my gloved hands and I see a little tuft of white on the top of its head.

Yep--definitely a skunk.

Thankfully (and again, a little sad), it was too weak and tiny to do any skunk-like behaviours. IT just sat in my hands and looked at us.

As well, its mud soaked tail was under it and it wasn't moving much.

Now the regret happens right here. See, hindsight's always 20/20--I should've attempted to wash off the mud.

Instead, I just carried the little skunk to the 'back 40' and let it go. It did manage to crawl away towards a nice shaded spot under a tree (presumably, that's where the grubs and stuff that skunks eat are hiding) in the field, so it was capable of moving. But after it was out of sight, I thought about the mud, and the fact that it'll harden--creating a not-needed impediment to the skunk’s locomotion.

So that was sticking in the back of my mind the rest of the night--I was hoping that the skunk would be fine.

Here's where the coincidence comes in.

The fate of the baby skunk has been drifting around my mind since last night.

I get on the highway this morning, and the very first car I see had a licence plate--

SKUNK U

Yeah, I didn't need to see that.