‘Twas two nights before Christmas, and all through the house, the air smelled of baking, no doubt by my spouse. The tree lights were twinkling, the stockings hung tight, each ribbon and bauble reflecting the light. I poured us some glögg, the cinnamon bold, and marveled at memories—new ones and old. Then, out in the yard, came a rustling sound; the recycling bin had been knocked to the ground! But wait—through the shadows, a scuttling thunk. No raccoon at all, but that flowerbed punk! The woodchuck—my rival, my furry torment— Had come back for vengeance, or maybe just scent. He snorted and waddled, as bold as could be, then looked in my eyes, quite unbothered by me. The cone flowers he’d leveled flashed back in my mind— last spring’s devastation of the botanical kind. I dashed to the closet, adrenaline high, my trusty air rifle glinting close by. I pumped it up twice, then three times—no fear— and crept through the moonlight, my quarry quite near. He froze by the trash can, then vanished from sight— a ghost in the snow, a brown blur in the night. I fired! It ricocheted straight off the bin, and startled the neighbors (and probably him). Now back in my slippers, my pride slightly dented, I pondered the duel that fate had fermented. The beast lives to burrow, to mock, and to feast— and I, the defeated, salute the fat beast.