It’s Raining….Rats.

After a blissful weekend with the family, I approached Monday with cautious optimism. Sunday had been filled with sun and celebration of my mom’s birthday. I had even managed to get all three children to take a nap at the same time. I got to lay out on my deck, ocean in plain view and a margarita in my hand. Sunday was nice. You can see why I thought that Monday was going to be okay, I was going to not only survive the first day of my work week…I might actually have a good day. (insert maniacal laughter here)

Getting ready this morning, Kevin and I were having yet another lively discussion about disaster preparedness. I explained that Jesus could take me at any moment now because my closet was actually clean. Any of you who remember my shopping post last year, know that my closet being clean and organized is as sure as sign as any that the apocalypse is forthcoming. In fact, pretty sure that the Bible mentions it in Revelations. Right after the giant cosmic battle for the world begins and right before Jesus shows up on a horse.

Jesus rides a horse? Girl what Bible you reading?

Look, you are missing the point. My closet is clean. It wasn’t until the closet was in a lesser state of chaos that I noticed one of the overhead lights was out and one of the sliding doors wasn’t sliding anymore. After mentioning my to-do list to Kevin,  he gets out of the shower, wraps a towel around himself and walks over to my closet to inspect the situation. His main job description, aside from Disaster Planner, is Fixer Man. Oh and Trash Man. I don’t do trash. People, it is pretty glorious being married to me. Like really, awesome.

As he is inspecting the slow rolling door situation, he looks up at the overhead light. This is how “distractable” people do things, halfway into one problem, investigate other tangent. Apparently I am a “distractable” writer…..So, then he decides the light situation is more pressing and removes the plastic casing in front of the light. That’s when things go black. Black Monday. Here is the scene of the crime:

I am blow drying my hair (this is a theme these days) and hear a little girl scream. A little 6’4″ 190 lb girl. As I start to laugh, thinking that Kevin must have encountered a spider in this little adventure.

Oh no, so much worse than that.

Remember the part of the story where I say that Kevin was only wearing a towel? Well, as he is removing the plastic, a rat fell upon him. NOT a small one. NOT a live one.

A.BIG.DEAD.RAT.

Oh, you think I’m kidding?

This object, formerly known as Rat, was nearly petrified. It had been sitting in that casing for so long that it was probably the reason the light burned out in the first place. Clearly the light in the picture above leads to crawl space access  so it is not an unlikely scenario that this rat would end up there. However, what I want to know is who endured the smell of this rat carcass decaying? When this guy went to the big rat heaven in the sky, the scent, made worse by the fluorescent light he was cooking under, couldn’t have been pleasant. What in the world landlord – really? It isn’t like our house was empty for any long period of time before we moved in so someone had to wonder what was “cooking” in that bathroom.

After the rat and the screaming and the almost puking were all completed. I cautiously got ready for the rest of my day. A day that just really couldn’t get any worse right? I mean when your day starts with petrified rats falling from the sky, clearly things can only get better?

Yeah, then I got a parking ticket at work. Seriously.

If this week keeps going in this direction, I am pretty sure the disaster preparedness will be fully necessary. Those zombies just might show up after all. Well, at least my closet is clean, and as of now, rat free.

Related posts:

1. A Pox On You!
2. Wolverines!
3. Me, Myself and I
4. So….
5. Operation Upheaval: Volumne 1, Chapter 2