Rats and Roaches....

After arriving home from our Christmas Holiday in Portland, we had an unpleasant and unexpected house warming gift. We went into the kitchen one morning to find a half eaten tomato and little doo doo everywhere. When Andrea was doing dishes she heard something moving around in a plastic bag on top of the cabinets. You could tell by how loud it was being that it was not a little lizard as may be expected. Andrea decided that she should wait until someone got out of the shower before she ventured back into the kitchen to see for sure what it was. When Ms. Brooks finally got out of the shower and came back into the kitchen, she asked Andrea why she was standing looking into the kitchen. Andrea told her that she heard something moving in the bag on top of the cabinet. At that point Ms. Brooks being the brave soul that she is climbed on top of a stool with a broom and began moving the bag around in an effort to get the little creature out of the bag. Next thing I knew, some one was screaming bloody murder. I quickly rinsed off, jumped out of the shower and went to see who had been shot. Too my surprise it was just Andrea and Ms. Brooks. They told me the entire story and said that the little or big rat according to them ran out of the bag and down the wall and out the window. They were shaking in their boots. Andrea had piddled herself and Ms. Brooks was on the ground in a fetal position. ---

Alright I (Andrea) had to take over this story because Will was getting a little out of hand…the "doo doo" as he puts it was getting a little too deep! So there was indeed a rat in our house and yes he was big, hairy, and nasty. We thought he went out the window but boy were we dead wrong. When we came home from work we found another half eaten tomato. Ms. Brooks put out some rat poison with peanut butter and we figured that night we would kill him. He ate the poison that night and survived! The next night we set a trap with a piece of cheese on it. The little bastard ate the cheese and managed to escape being caught. We found out he was in a bin on the back porch- we carefully took the bin outside and each grabbed a machete- when he came running out we would simply chop (kill) him with our machete’s. Easier said than done- the rat came flying out of the barrel and there I was chasing him through our back yard…the little shit escaped! I thought he would be smart enough to know that coming back into our house would be a bad idea…boy was I dead wrong…the next morning we woke up and found 3 half eaten tomato’s. We set the trap one last time- wrapped the cheese in plastic and tied it to the trap. Much to our surprise that night we caught him! I just hope he didn’t tell all of his friends about the great tomatoes in our house!

Will also found some roaches in the cupboard. It’s amazing because we’ve been here for almost 7 months and I am not as freaked out about them. He just sprayed them and that was that!

I would like to direct everyone to Grace’s final blog post. She was a Peace Corps Volunteer living about a block away from us. She left us the day before yesterday and I can’t quite put it as eloquently as she does so check it out at... http://iboughtapairofbirkenstocks.blogspot.com/ I just need her to know how much we will miss her! It was great getting to know her and having her bubbly personality around!

Lastly a big uop (thanks) to Gail and Luke for sending us a great care package with lots of bug spray and goodies we really appreciated it! Big uop to Lindsey and Brandon as well- they sent a nice package for Christmas too- more goodies! And the final Big uop goes out to my dad- he sent us a GREAT package with movies, popcorn, candy, and lotion! Finally I need to tell everyone thank you for sending us Christmas Cards: Michael and Erin, Grandma and Grandpa Hoobing, Grandma and Grandpa Farner, Annie and Steve, Jeannie and Terry Newlan, and Mario and Alice Reyes! We really appreciated them! Love to Everyone! We miss you all!

P.S. Will updated our photos on flickr so take a look- the link on the top right of the page labeled Schumaker Photos!