My bed is lofted.
I wanted it up high to fulfill my lifelong childhood dreams of being a twin who got the upper bunk. That can’t be helped, but Camp Hayward and my loft in Punta Sirain are slowly healing my aching heart, but letting me sleep up high in a tree fort sort of way. The part of the wall surrounding my bed is lined with a plastic tarp – this is so rain doesn’t get come in between the wall slats and soak me to the bone at night. Genius. I know.
Well, a rat (or mouse or whatever) moved into the space in between the plastic tarp and the wood wall. Fabulous.
We’ll call him Rick. Rick the Rat. Rick makes a horrifying screeching noise at night that makes me feel like I’m witnessing a homicide. I’ve waken up, heart beating, sweating, and out of a dream to this terror of a noise more times than I’d like to remember.
Something must be done….but what?
If I buy rat poison, Nacho (my cat) will eat it and die. If I shove the poison down into the tarp where Rick lives, he dies IN the tarp and stinks up the joint. If I take the tarp down, then Rick might jump out and touch me. No.
So I leave Rick be. Until I come back from Carnival to see that the corner of my bedroom smells like pee…from Rick.
Oh this will not do.
Here is my brilliant idea. Boil water, add bleach, and pour it down the wall in between the plastic and the wood. Not only will it poison and burn Rick, but will disinfect the area and get rid of the smell of mouse pee. Told you it was brilliant.
So up I go into the loft
, push the bed aside, cut a hole in the tarp, and down my Clorox-y steamy hot mixture of death goes.
Rick flees- but what flops out onto the floor – a bat! Rick is a bat?!?! No! Rick is the rat is living with a friend- a bat!
I wanted it up high to fulfill my lifelong childhood dreams of being a twin who got the upper bunk. That can’t be helped, but Camp Hayward and my loft in Punta Sirain are slowly healing my aching heart, but letting me sleep up high in a tree fort sort of way. The part of the wall surrounding my bed is lined with a plastic tarp – this is so rain doesn’t get come in between the wall slats and soak me to the bone at night. Genius. I know.
Well, a rat (or mouse or whatever) moved into the space in between the plastic tarp and the wood wall. Fabulous.
We’ll call him Rick. Rick the Rat. Rick makes a horrifying screeching noise at night that makes me feel like I’m witnessing a homicide. I’ve waken up, heart beating, sweating, and out of a dream to this terror of a noise more times than I’d like to remember.
Something must be done….but what?
If I buy rat poison, Nacho (my cat) will eat it and die. If I shove the poison down into the tarp where Rick lives, he dies IN the tarp and stinks up the joint. If I take the tarp down, then Rick might jump out and touch me. No.
So I leave Rick be. Until I come back from Carnival to see that the corner of my bedroom smells like pee…from Rick.
Oh this will not do.
Here is my brilliant idea. Boil water, add bleach, and pour it down the wall in between the plastic and the wood. Not only will it poison and burn Rick, but will disinfect the area and get rid of the smell of mouse pee. Told you it was brilliant.
So up I go into the loft
, push the bed aside, cut a hole in the tarp, and down my Clorox-y steamy hot mixture of death goes.Rick flees- but what flops out onto the floor – a bat! Rick is a bat?!?! No! Rick is the rat is living with a friend- a bat!
Look to the left of the propane tank, there´s the bat! Eeeew he´s so gross!
So I have a rat, and a bat, both living way to close to my sleeping mat, good thing I wear hats, if it wasn’t for my mosquito net at night they might give me a tap, it’s a job for my cat, they’re both total brats.
The bat, we’ll call him Bob. So Bob the bat flops on the floor in his hot chlorinated drunkenness and moves around. I run and scream out of the house. Rick is no wear in sight. Nacho is slowly following Bob – but not attempting to kill him (worthless feline). My neighbors are laughing at me – for the millionth time – can Edi really live in the campo?
Bob half-assly flops himself like a fish out of water around my house for 15 minutes. The kids come over. More Clorox water is thrown. We take pictures. He manages to get on the railing of the porch and flies off into the evening mist. Gone for good, I hope.
But that’s not all.
As I sit on my porch writing this tragic tale to y’all the horrid smell of dying animal passes by. This is not uncommon since I basically live on a farm where dogs, cats, chickens, cows, and ducks run amok. They die sometimes, and it stinks.
So I think it’s the wind. Nope. It’s Nacho, inside, eating Rick the Rat for dinner oh-so-daintily. If you can call blood on the floor and the crunch crunch crunching of rat bones daintily. Nacho looks so polite.
So I have a rat, and a bat, both living way to close to my sleeping mat, good thing I wear hats, if it wasn’t for my mosquito net at night they might give me a tap, it’s a job for my cat, they’re both total brats.
The bat, we’ll call him Bob. So Bob the bat flops on the floor in his hot chlorinated drunkenness and moves around. I run and scream out of the house. Rick is no wear in sight. Nacho is slowly following Bob – but not attempting to kill him (worthless feline). My neighbors are laughing at me – for the millionth time – can Edi really live in the campo?
Bob half-assly flops himself like a fish out of water around my house for 15 minutes. The kids come over. More Clorox water is thrown. We take pictures. He manages to get on the railing of the porch and flies off into the evening mist. Gone for good, I hope.
But that’s not all.
As I sit on my porch writing this tragic tale to y’all the horrid smell of dying animal passes by. This is not uncommon since I basically live on a farm where dogs, cats, chickens, cows, and ducks run amok. They die sometimes, and it stinks.
So I think it’s the wind. Nope. It’s Nacho, inside, eating Rick the Rat for dinner oh-so-daintily. If you can call blood on the floor and the crunch crunch crunching of rat bones daintily. Nacho looks so polite.
Some final notes…
Prior to all of this 3 American doctors showed up in town, gave out free meds to my people, and I gave them the whole “this is what Peace Corps life is like” sphele. I toured them around the community and they took pictures.
I read 50 pages in The Monsters of Templeton by Lauren Groff.
I perfected the art of pancake making as well as captured my cat back from the disgruntled neighbors who take care of him while I’m away, out of site. They wanted to keep him. No way José. Nacho is mine; he eats rats like Rick for dinner.
This was my Wednesday, February 24, 2010
RIP Rick the Rat & Bob the Bat
And finally, Nacho is earning his keep.
0 comments:
Post a Comment