When the alarm went off this morning, I was fairly certain that this was just going to be another day on the hamster wheel. My day was probably going to look like this:
Though I'm not certain things have improved, per se, they are certainly starting to change:
In fact, since I have called the exterminator, a crushing admission of defeat, frankly, I'm kind of hoping for this to happen once he arrives:
See, I've been playing hide and seek with a rodent. This game started last summer, when I noticed a tarantula hole along one of the walls in the back yard. I was thrilled! Tarantulas are not only cool, but they are also awesome. Some might even say, well, super awesome. Their holes look like this:
Tarantulas, in all their glory, look like this:
Since I am such a friend to nature, I decided to pour a tiny bit of water into the hole to see if the tarantula would pop out. I had no intention of actually killing the spider; I merely wanted a good look at it. One cannot give a tarantula a suitable name unless one has actually personally seen the individual in question. I began making a mental list of possible tarantula names. Tula. Tim. Trevor. Tina. Tristram Shandy. I slowly started to add water to the hole, excited to be naming the first tarantula ever to be seen in my back yard.
When a rodent bolted out and ran across my foot, however, I screamed and started to worry about hantavirus. After concluding that I was having trouble breathing not because I was in the last stages of drowning in my own lung fluids but because I was panicking, I turned the hose on full blast and created a cement-like tomb of the hole. The dirt in my back yard is chemically the same as most concretes; to activate it and make sidewalks, only water is required. Not useful when cultivating a garden. Very useful when entombing a rodent.
Of course, this was merely a laughable obstacle in the life of The Jerk, which is how I started to refer to the rodent. My mother began calling for daily updates about my dealings with The Jerk, so often did I worry about the looming threat of death from hantavirus. She would reassure me that short of putting my face into the hole of the rodent, stirring it up and then breathing deeply, it was unlikely that I would contract hantavirus. It was a good effort on her part, but I really never believed her. Ask anyone. It was clear to me that the mouse had to go or I would die a painful death brought on not by
scurvy, which had been my dream disease, but hantavirus. Ick.
Anyway, The Jerk, thinking that he was Jason Bourne, started to move his holes around the back yard. He dug a hole underneath a flower pot. Instant entombment via garden hose. Next, a new hole under the wood pile. Not only did this give me good reason to have a bonfire and eliminate his little nest, entombment via bleach was the obvious next step in the war.
After a few weeks of obsessive perimeter checking at all hours of the day and night, hopes that that I had finally killed The Jerk started to grow -- the yard had remained hole free. Until I found a new hole, in the front yard, prompting the Poison Battle of 2007. Nothing was out of bounds in this war: nail polish remover, Avon's Skin So Soft, Comet, Ajax, laundry soap, shaving cream, oven cleaner, Windex, kerosene, human urine, old paint, toilet cleaner, dishwasher soap, paint thinner. Finally, he either gave up and moved away, or died. Either way, I won.
As of a few days ago, I had been telling the story of my epic victory to anyone who would listen. And then I noticed the new hole, right underneath the faucet next to the garage. The Jerk had returned.
I was ready -- lye went into his hole, followed by water followed by heavy destruction of the hole via shovel. I was cautiously optimistic that this would be the end of him.
How I underestimated this new soldier.
The Jerk moved into the backyard, digging a hole next to the sliding glass door, in full view of all of my cats. Who, by the way, received an immediate reduction in pay for not bringing this transgression to my attention. I brought out two trays of tempting poison pellets, certain that The Jerk could not refuse the heady ambrosial smell. He responded by digging another hole underneath one of the trays.
This morning, I poured an entire gallon of bleach into both holes and then smashed all of the surrounding dirt into a compact mass. Within twenty minutes, The Jerk had redug another hole, mere centimeters from the last one. It is clear that this new version of the The Jerk is a Cylon. He has downloaded all of his knowledge into a new, super powerful rodent body, and just.won't.die. I think that he knows that I have both choco-mint cookies in the pantry as well as a can of cherry pie filling and he is determined to have his share.
So here I am. Waiting for the exterminator. My pride punched full of holes. My morale causing my head to hang in shame. Perhaps, though, this is actually a sign of a strong general. Maybe I just need fresh troops. Yes -- this thing will end. I will again be victorious, soon planting a spike with The Jerk's corpse dangling in the wind, as a warning to other rebel Cylon rodents. I will defeat him.
Note: Check out the fantastic art of
Graham Roumieu, who has clearly also done battle with rodents. My money says that he won, too.
It's now official. My mom is part robot. This device is her super fantastic new knee -- just installed today! She wasn't amused when I suggested that she should consider participating in the Miss America Pageant, since they now accept participants with, gasp, scars. I did get a tiny smile when I congratulated her for winning six months worth of free ballroom dancing lessons, though she did ask me how much I had paid for that and whether or not the gift certificate was non-refundable. I asked her if they had taken any x-rays of her cool new robotic parts to which she merely rolled her eyes and then pretended to fall asleep. Hopefully it will look awesome, like this:
I bet that she will be very excited to see the motivational poster that I made, which includes all of the activities that she can now do with her brand new body part:
Though this is frowned upon:
This would be perfectly acceptable:
And:
And probably even this:
She could even start a new hobby:
But this position is not allowed:
Or this:
I'll wait to tell her until she is freshly doped up again, in about 2.5 hours.
Since she has another knee that may, someday, need a similar operation, and she loves to save money, I'm going to learn how to do it myself. I even have the anesthesia issue resolved:
