I pity Sigmund Freud, because he didn’t have Facebook. I feel bad for Karl Jung, and Carl Stumpf, and those other fathers of modern psychology too. How were they able to drag this discipline out of its infancy without the armada of diagnostic tools that’s recently appeared from over the horizon of social media? I refer to evaluations such as:

15 Unmistakable, Outrageously Secret Signs You’re an Extrovert
23 Signs You’re Secretly An Introvert
23 Signs You’re Secretly a Narcissist Masquerading as a Sensitive Introvert
10 Ways to Tell if You’re Confident – or Arrogant
5 Ways To Know You’re Watching a Spielberg Movie

Those represent just a tiny fragment of the avalanche of mental health/personality syndrome quizzes we are enjoying.

I can’t help tossing my pebble into the landslide. I found a gap in the flow of helpful questionnaires, and I’ve applied my profound lack of expertise to the challenge if filling it. I present “Nine Ways To Tell If You’re a Raccoon.”

Just answer the questions using the five-point scale below. Be honest. This thing doesn’t work if you aren’t honest, and then you walk around for the rest of your life in doubt about whether you’re a raccoon. Once you’ve finished, add up your points and read your results!

The Five-Point Scale
5 – This is me. It describes me perfectly.
4 – This sort of describes me. Maybe when I feel nostalgic or I’ve been drinking.
3 – Eh. Maybe this describes me, maybe it doesn’t. Is Walking Dead on?
2 – This doesn’t describe me too well. It might once in a while, like on Halloween.
1 – This isn’t me. You’re talking about a squirrel, or a goat or something.

The Questions

1. ___ I can always find my way back to a place with good food, such as Fuzzy’s Tacos or the garbage can in your garage.

2. ___ I enjoy social activities like tormenting your cat until it cowers behind the air conditioner in a neurotic stupor.

3. ___ When the weather is cold, I like to snuggle down into a blanket made from the insulation under your Jacuzzi.

4. ___ If you make your garden unpleasant by blasting talk radio all night, I’ll just chew through the screen on your utility room window and pee on your clothes.

5. ___ I like the night life. I like to boogie.

6. ___ I think food always tastes better when someone gives it to me for free. That includes birdseed in a feeder hanging from a greased pole sprayed with Tabasco sauce and adorned with peppermint-soaked cotton balls stuffed into pantyhose. That also includes French fries on an unattended plate.

7. ___ I’m secretly laughing at everyone around me.

8. ___ I find ornamental ponds so compelling. I especially love those goldfish that swim around in them.

9. ___ Even though I have opposable thumbs, I rarely find an opportunity to poke some idiot in the eye with a stick.

Now let’s see how you scored!

Under 20: Sorry, you’re not even a good simulation of a raccoon, and you’re probably not too cute, either. Move to Cuba (where raccoons are extinct).

21-35: You have strong raccoon tendencies, which you can cultivate with some effort. Chew your way into the attic a few times, and wash your chicken wings in the gutter before you eat them. There’s hope for you.

Over 35: Hooray! You are among nature’s most insidiously destructive cute animals! Let’s go tear some shit up and eat garbage!

Don’t feel bad if you aren’t a raccoon. We all have our place in the magnificent tapestry that is existence, and although you suck you might be lucky enough for a raccoon to eat part of your body after you die.

Photo by Svdmolen
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