Ugh....shuddering...just had horrible nightmares
well my dear sweet daughter, her child and husband moved into their new home in West Asheville
So I spent the past week at my vacated house in A-ville proper, cleaning it up and getting my furniture in it to spend more time there to begin the final leg of the restoration which is the interior work
Since the baby was born nearing 2 years ago they (daughter and SIL) have been doing what is referred to as "attachment parenting" whatever the make the beast with two backs that means...
I do know it means that nothing else gets maintained for nearly 2 years except the needs of the second coming of the Christ-Child, her son
So I have a basement that is still filled with left over lumber from the exterior restoration,,,scrap wood that I wanted to pitch into a 30 yard dumpster, but SIL lectured me on wastefulness, plus it is piled wall-to-wall with all my S-I-L's possessions, favorite old electric motors, blacksmithing equipment etc etc...I mean PACKED!...the guy has selective hoarding issues
and a yard that is completely overgrown
now my daughter felt it was proper and correct to have a composting heap down by the bottom edge of the property,
she planted various fruit and vegetable beds all around my yard (that I envisioned as a world class croquet lawn course)
and she also created a "pond"....
behind the raised Toolshed that we built, my S-I-L kept many jugs and two 55 gallon drums of used cooking oil harvested from local restaurants to run his bio-diesel conversions
now these things are all well and good out in the countryside....but in an urban setting.........
I asked her to refrain from pretending she was in some bucolic commune and to deal with urban reality
fast forward......
a year or so ago they bulldozed a leftover 30 or 40 unit 1960's era 2 story Great Society housing project that was in tumble-down condition...
it was about a half-mile up the road
they gave the tenants a relocation...flattened the place with bulldozers and the city sold the land to developers for upper income property development
I was told this was in the works when I bought my house in 2006...yippee property value jackpot finally...well if we weren't in the second great depression maybe
well the city moved the two-legged tenants out...
but not the four-legged ones...they were left behind to fend for themselves
So when my daughter called me to lament the dislocation of society's victims (oh jeez spare me) and the bulldozing of their clump of failed social experiment up the road...well my response was to tell her to IMMEDIATELY
clear-cut the nuts and berries,
rip out her make the beast with two backsing reflecting pond and to get the pond drained and filled in
and to shovel her composting heap/dump into bags and get it off the land
I would have told her to get the cooking grease drums off the property but I had no idea they were there behind the shed
But I am a paranoid old worrier....what do I know....nothing was done
So guess who found paradise in my yard and under my shed?
Guess who has been probing my packed and cluttered basement?
Yes the rats.....fat squeaking Norwegian legacies of Lyndon Johnson's ridiculous Great Society Program
She did not bother telling me I was right...
and so you can imagine my surprise and delight as I was destroying a brand new Home Depot lawnmower last week
by using it as a bush-hog in the yard...
a large (well-fed I might add) fat make the beast with two backsing jumbo rat bounded out of a vegetable patch I was nearing with the lawnmower
I chased the make the beast with two backser with the lawnmower across the yard until I hit a rock half-buried and the mower stopped with a loud clang...
the rock discovery and ensuing loud clang of the blade being destroyed was frequent...I need to go get a replacement blade now
all the "gardens" (rat feeding stations) and the "pond" (rat refreshment station) were lined with rocks...but now hidden under tall weed grass of neglect
landmines
marched into the house...called an exterminator....told him to bring Sarin gas canisters, Mustard gas, flame throwers and edible poisons in bulk, I told him it was ok to bring .22's with hicap magazines loaded with snake-shot too, and night-vision gear....he laughed
but he did come over.....after reviewing the situation he told me he had seen much worse....so I asked him if he ever worked the now-flattened project up the road to find "worse"
Seems my colony is living under the tool shed and that is its main base of operations...
my neighbor across the street told me that he had them too but got a bunch of cats....
I am sorry but the make the beast with two backsers I saw (saw 2 more during my stay) would take down a cat in short order...you need some trained and dedicated Rat Terriers to work with this crew of ghetto pets
but the cats may have served to annoy the neighbor's rats enough to make them move over to my Rodent Resort
so the poison is laid out in my basement and around the shed...let's see if that works....I have sprayed down every shred of underbrush, poison ivy, vine and scrub plant with EPA Super Fund types of plant killers to eliminate ground cover
I am renting a 30 yard dumpster and have told my SIL that when he returns from vacation with my daughter and the Christ Child the shit in the basement either goes to his new place or into the dumpster by a Sept 15 drop dead date...
make the beast with two backs their goddam conceits and notions of recycling and organic gardening...
scurrying rats and monster cockroaches swimming up into the toilet bowl were part of my childhood overseas...I have worked too long and too hard to have that shit NOT be part of my life...ever make the beast with two backsing again
Next project is tearing down the shed after we have a sufficient body-count of rodents...to do it now would probably inspire the Colony of Rodentia to orchestrate an uprising and launch a counter-attack at the house for new shelter
For now letting them think it is BAU with extra new food sources is the best strategy
fortunately my step-daughter has moved into the house for maybe a few months or longer...she is normal...
and she is not afraid of dealing with rats/mice etc having lived for 7 years in Philly's Germantown....God Bless her
here is the current battlefield over a year ago when we were painting the high end of the house....and the Shed of Rodentia....the blue drums were water barrels for the organic gardens (rat feeding stations)
more to come.....
