It’s battle stations now to get rid of the rat in our garden
HIMSELF HAS BEEN PATROLLING THE GARDEN DAILY, CHECKING HIS TRAPS BUT SO FAR THE WILY LITTLE FECKER HAS EVADED US
ANOTHER week another problem except this time it’s not something trivial like running out of teabags or forgetting to put the bins out. This problem is big and hairy with four legs: We have a rat!
An actual real, genuine bloody big rat that has been giving us the runaround (literally) for days!
OK so he’s (I’m presuming it’s a ‘ he’ because I always assume scary creatures are ‘Hes’!) not actually in the house but he has come close enough to our bedroom window that he could be in like Flynn in seconds if the window was open, which it often is.
The first time I saw him I was gazing out the window at the overgrown trees at the end of the garden. I saw something move on the path. At first I thought it was a squirrel, then a big mouse but as the little fecker came closer and stared brazenly up at me, I realised it was a rat.
Obviously I did what any self respecting woman who believes in equality would do – I screamed, ran around the house shutting all the windows and rang Himself. Of course he didn’t believe me. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t a mouse?’ he says in the same patronising tone he uses to explain sport to me.
‘Well unless it’s a mouse on steroids! I know a bloody rat when I see one.’ There may have been a little bit of ambiquity used in that last comment but when there’s a rodent outside your bedroom window and you live in a bungalow, you take whatever action necessary.
When he arrives home there is no sign of the rat. Of course there isn’t. But he didn’t have to wait long. The next morning he calls me. ‘Your friend is back’ and there he was again, outside our bedroom window just staring up at us as if to say, ‘come on suckers! come and get me!’
That was it! Operation Boomtown was born! Himself went off and bought poison and rat traps and rodent catching paraphenalia, the likes of which I’d never seen before. He consulted with the neighbours and google.
Remember the milkman who I couldn’t get to talk to me for the last ten years? He’s my new best friend. Apparently rat catching is his speciality subject. 15 minutes he spent telling me how he caught all the rats in his house and how he gleefully collected all the bodies of ‘ the little b******s’ in his attic. (I’m actually not so sure I want him to talk to me now.)
The Postman told me about catching them in a Wavin pipe, a neighbour told me if there’s one, there’s more and the Zara delivery guy told me that stealth is your only man! Himself has been patrolling the garden daily, checking his traps but so far the wily little fecker has evaded us.
Considering the Teenager is due to host a birthday barbeque for all his friends next weekend in our garden, Operation Boomtown may need to be upgraded to Shock And Awe! Somebody pass Himself the shovel – this could get messy!