I like rodents. I feed squirrels by hand in my garden and have a menagerie of nocturnal critters in my home. At one point our family owned 2 albino rats, a sugar glider (flying squirrel), 7 chinchillas, a hedgehog and one lard ass rabbit....proof that I do indeed like rodents. I do NOT, however, like the uninvited ones who take a detour into my house. I grew up watching horror movies like Willard and Ben, and like every child from that era, had nightmares of rats descending on my body, gnawing off a limb or two, picking my bones clean.
Imagine my surprise recently when I came home from the gym, stripped down for a shower and hopped onto my bed for a quick peek at Facebook....when the unthinkable occurred. Something gray scurried across my bedroom floor. My hands froze on the keyboard. What the hell was THAT? I waited a moment....but nothing happened. Just my imagination playing tricks on me. I resumed typing. Wait...what was that rustling sound in the corner? I ignored it.
And then that terrible moment when I looked up from my laptop and saw IT----the black sheep cousin of the squirrel family----a gray rat staring up at me.
"AHHHHHH!!!!!"
The rat seemed equally horrified to see me in my birthday suit and quickly darted under the dresser (I briefly wondered if my being naked might have that effect on humans, too). Holy hell in a hand basket! I'm the Squirrel Whisperer, not a Rat Whisperer!
"Ohmygawd, ohmygawd, ohmygawd!!!" Of course no one else was home to catch the vile creature, because this is typically the kind of crap that always happens just to me. I was suddenly cast in the sequel to Willard and I knew the outcome wasn't going to be good.
My heart was racing as I furiously typed a message to my Facebook friends: "HEEELP MEEE!" Moments later, that rat bastard scurried out again, took one look at me and dashed under the bed----right beneath me.
There I was, perched naked on my bed like a stone gargoyle, terrified of dipping one toe off the mattress.....afraid Willard might gnaw on it.
I'm not sure how long I stayed that way, but the messages came pouring in on my Facebook page:
"Get a frying pan and kill that little bastard...but be sure to video tape it..."
"What? No! Gross! Oh GAWD, I can hear it making scritchety, scratchety sounds."
"That's your baby rat, snickering under your bed, trying to find a way to crawl up there and visit you."
"NOOOOO!"
"He's making a nest in your box spring."
"You are NOT helping the situation! Seriously, I need to get in the shower now. If you don't hear from me again, Willard killed me..."
"Where's that bad-ass pug of yours? He'll get the rat."
"My pug wears a diaper---what does THAT tell you?"
"If you had a ferret like I used to, he'd maul the rat."
"I can't even get off my bed! How in holy hell am I supposed to get to the pet store to buy a ferret?"
"You'll have to move or burn down the house..."
"Get some industrial sized, ass-kicking boots!"
"I'm going to sick my ninja chinchillas on the rat. I know that damn stalker rodent is still in the house, somewhere..."
"I think your chinchillas will just party down with him. They might even show him where all the good munchies are."
" How am I going to sleep in my room tonight? Totally skeeved here..."
Rather than live in fear every time I entered my bedroom, I tried to think of the rat as a sweet natured rodent straight out of a Beatrix Potter tale. I named him Edgar and I imagined him hanging out with
Peter The Rabbit in a tiny blue vest with reading glasses on his nose as he sipped tea and read the stacks of trashy romance novels stashed under my bed. I assumed he'd make a soft bed out of the dust motes that swirled around the corners of my room and live off the stale crusts of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches that my son was so fond of leaving around the house. But every night when I went to bed, I pulled the covers over my head and prayed that I would not wake to little rat hands twisting my hair into a comfy nest.
Peter The Rabbit in a tiny blue vest with reading glasses on his nose as he sipped tea and read the stacks of trashy romance novels stashed under my bed. I assumed he'd make a soft bed out of the dust motes that swirled around the corners of my room and live off the stale crusts of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches that my son was so fond of leaving around the house. But every night when I went to bed, I pulled the covers over my head and prayed that I would not wake to little rat hands twisting my hair into a comfy nest.
A week later I discovered a horrible odor emanating from my laundry room. Someone suggested that perhaps it was the stink of sweaty gym clothes left in the laundry basket, or that maybe my teenaged son hadn't showered in awhile. But I knew immediately what I was dealing with----rat zombie stench. Edgar had donned his little, white Elvis suit and left the building. Sure enough---behind the washing machine we discovered a fuzzy, little carcass chillin' with eleven pairs of socks that had mysteriously disappeared from the laundry in 2009.