Seattleites are sharing videos of Jimothy Raccoon, a deformed raccoon with a truncated backbone whose odd shape has made it look, to some viewers, like a creature not of this earth. The animal has turned into a local fixation as clips of it moving through backyards and balconies spread online.
That attention is arriving now because the sightings are being passed around in real time. One Instagram video shows Jimothy darting along a suburban yard and up a set of stone stairs. Another captures the raccoon on a balcony railing, squeezing between two bars, lingering for a moment, then slipping out of frame. Those clips, along with a few others, have drawn thousands of likes and comments and made Jimothy a regular fixture on Seattle subreddits and on subreddits like Weird and Creepy.
Jimothy has become the kind of local internet celebrity that starts with a strange sighting and grows each time someone hits share. The raccoon’s appearance has led many people to assume short spine syndrome, a very rare congenital condition that can significantly shorten the spine. But Jimothy has not been formally diagnosed, and that gap has become part of the appeal: people are reacting to what they can see, while the cause of the deformity remains unconfirmed.
What is clear is that the videos are doing the work of turning a backyard animal into a citywide obsession. With only a few videos of Jimothy out so far, each new clip is likely to feed the cycle again, especially as Seattle residents keep posting sightings and more people discover the raccoon through social media and Reddit.
