. . . the rat came back.

Well, not THE rat. No, he (or she) is gone for good. But A rat has definitely come to call on the dirty, dank, and apparently, quite porous crawl space beneath our house. While the top part of our house is nice and sunny and modernized, the crawl space doesn't seem to have changed since the place was built in 1922. The floor is made of dirt, and in some parts, it's so cramped that you can't even crawl. You have to sidle on your belly. We've been known to find bits of coal down there, left over from the days that the house was heated by a coal-burning fireplace. It's scary. It's gross. It's a rat's paradise.

I guess that's why, lately, rats have come to our crawl space specifically to die. Last month, one croaked just below the guest bathroom when (of COURSE) we were expecting an out-of-town guest. It was horrible, but at least the corpse was in plain view in the crawl space and we (and by that I mean the nice guys at Rid-a-Critter) were able to get rid of it.

But this weekend (when, wouldn't you know it, some people were coming over for dinner) something died INSIDE THE HEATING DUCTS! Actually, from the smell coming through the vents, we think it died several days BEFORE the weekend. GROSSSSSSS!

Now, I'm waiting for some duct cleaners to come suck the corpse out with a giant vacuum cleaner, disinfect everything, and then, I imagine, go off and have a steak dinner with the large sum of money I'm going to give them for deverminizing my house--what little money we have left after doing our taxes this weekend, that is.

SIGH! This is one of those moments when I bang my head on the wall, Ally McBeal-style and remind myself, "I'm happy, I'm healthy. I'm happy, I'm healthy."

Which we all are, despite these little aggravations. LaLa's stomach bug is fully gone and she is her rosy-cheeked self, once again, if a little less pudgy than before. And at the end of the week, Husband and I have plans to go out for a nice dinner, sans LaLa, which is still a rare treat for us.

And in between? Hopefully we'll be crisis-free for a few days so I can finish my book proposal! Maybe I'll work a rodenty sub-plot into it. That way, I'll have gotten something out of this whole, disgusting episode. And maybe I could even write the corpse-vacuuming off on next year's taxes! (I can just see my old accountant--the one who laughed out loud when I asked her if I could write off my gym membership because I was a food critic who needed to work off all those extra calories--rolling her eyes.)

Whoops, gotta go. The duct guys have arrived. My knights in shining jumpsuits! More, and hopefully less disgusting, news later.

xoxo

Elizabeth