KIRO TV in Seattle did a segment on local bear spottings and two of my pictures of bears on our property were shown on TV and are in the following slide show, they are #8 and 9. The first one is a single black bear near our front door in Aug. 2005, took the picture from my car as i drove up one day; and the second one was last Spring, a mother and 2 cubs getting into our garbage, taken from our back door.
I don't know about you Washingtonians, but us Idahonians always say, "Don't feed the bears - let the bears feed you."
On a serious note, I think I'd rather meet a bear when taking out the trash than a skunk, and we're starting to see a few. They weren't here before, that I know of. Skunks are horrible...