As Indiana Jones put it, "Rats..."

The enemy is on my doorstep. My house is being invaded.

Two weeks ago when I opened my basement door I saw a dark shape scurry across the floor. It was the undeniable image of a rat. A big freakin' RAT. I told my dad about it, and two days later when he was down there, it ran right in front of him and spooked him good. So we set up a "Have a Heart" rat-trap near my dog's food bowl, and a few days later it was shut, but no rat inside.

Since then, when I go downstairs to do laundry I can hear the little bugger scurrying around in the back corners. At night my dogs wake us up with their barking. They can hear it too, and it freaks them out.

Last week when I went to the dryer, I could hear it close by, so I held my breath and waited. I heard it again. This time, it sounded like it was... above me? My mind raced through the possibilities - Was the rat waiting by the basement door, and when I came in, he shot up the stairs and into the kitchen above? I went back up the stairs and looked to see what was directly above the washing machine. It was the kitchen cabinets. And there, in the corner, underneath the cabinet doors, hidden from sight, was a hole. I showed my dad and he agreed: It had been chewed.

So we set up the Have a Heart trap there, and three days ago I find it shut again, but this time, no rat. My dad and I speculate that perhaps the rat is so large, the trap door shuts on his body and he is able to back himself out. SPOOKY.

Yesterday, when I went downstairs, I stopped on the last bottom step and looked into the corner where it dwells. After a few seconds, I see him. And he doesn't see me. I watch as he crawls up some old wood and corner molding we have stacked back in the corner, then as he crawls up the BRICK wall, and into the crawlspace, which is at head level across the way. He didn't look so big. He actually looked kind of cute. I do some internet research and determine that, based on the length of his tail and estimated body size, he must be a large mouse, and not a rat at all.

I call my dad, who has been staying over at the new house he bought with his girlfriend (which he plans to move into in the next few months) the past week, and let him know I saw it and think it's a mouse. He disagrees, saying he swears the rat he saw was as large as his hand. I think his mind is making it bigger.

Well, today, I go back downstairs, and like clockwork, I see the Rat appear on the wood, and crawl back up the brick wall and into the crawlspace, just like yesterday. I smile to myself and think he might be easy to capture now. And then, just before I set my barefeet on the basement floor, without warning, the biggest, darkest, ugliest looking Demon Rat I've ever seen, comes running out from the corner towards me.

What the Hell?! There's only supposed to be one of them! Well he looks at me, and I look at him, and in a split second, we both turn tail and run back in the direction we came from, he to his corner, and me back up the stairs to safety. I was friggin' spooked.


An ROUS from "The Princess Bride"

Two Rats. @#$%.

I go back down to do some Recon. I sit on the steps and wait. And back in the crawlspace, I hear them moving. Then I hear the most god-awful sound- the terrobly loud screeching and squealing of rats. Fighting. It's not something I'd like to hear twice in my life. That thing ROARED.

I get thoroughly creeped out, because I'm in nothing but my pj pants, and when sitting on the steps, the hole in the cabinet in the kitchen is directly at my eye level. I'm afraid to see a rat come out of it and run straight for my face. So I leave, compose myself, and go back down.

I sit a few steps lower, but still high enough to have an eagle eye view of things. I wait. And wait. And then I see it. The Rat comes slowly out from under the wood and starts sniffing around the water heater. Then I realize he's drinking from it! He drinks for a few, then runs back to the dark corner for safety. Then he comes back, drinks, runs back under the wood. This continues for awhile, and I figure this is a could sniper position to wait with the pellet gun.

Then, as I'm watching "Fatmouse" (dubbed by Jerome), Demon Rat pokes his head around the crawlspace, which I remind you, is at headlevel in the corner. That sucker just sits there and watches me as I watch Fatmouse drink. This goes on for another 10 minutes, and then I get my next shock for the day.

A third rat climbs up the wood and into the crawlspace with Demon Rat.
@#$%. Three rats. What's the chances of these suckers breeding.

I sat there for over an hour. Each minute got creepier than the next. Years of watching horror movies taught me to expect at any moment to feel a rat land on my shoulder from behind. I keep hearing the scratching, the pitter-patter of their feet everywhere. I get the feeling there is a rat hiding near my dog's food to the right of the stairs. I think he's spying on me as I spy on his family.

This happened just a few hours ago. Since then, I've gone back down and watched, and listened, and have come up with nothing new. Just moments ago, I heard something in the kitchen. When I poke my head around the corner, I see a tiny mouse-sized shape, lightning quick, streak from the Have a Heart trap, still filled with cereal, and into the hole in the cabinet.

That does it. They ARE breeding.

"Of course, you know, THIS means War!"

We now have Five options.

1. SNIPER ATTACK: I prepare my pellet gun, sit on the basement stairs in a sniper position, and await each rat to come to the water heater to drink. I pick them off, one by one, as they come down from the crawlspace to save their fallen comerades.

2. ENEMY CAPTURE: We buy more, bigger Have a Heart traps, set them up all over the house. Capture the three KNOWN Rats, and the one baby (there are assuredly more than one), and let them loose in the woods.

3. TORTURE: We buy lots of sticky traps, set them up all over, capture all until we see no more, then throw them out and let them starve.

4. DEATH BY FOOD: We set out rat poison and hope they don't all go and die somewhere in the crawlspaces and stink up the house to high heaven. Cause Lord knows I am NOT crawling back there to retrieve the corpses.

5. HIRE MERCENARIES: I buy a falcon and let him roost in the basement, seeking out and destroying all rats that cross his path. Or I guess I could buy a few snakes and let them do the job as well. But how to get rid of the snakes without Chinese Gorillas*...

These are my orders. Search and Destroy. Right now, I am setting up an ambush in the kitchen. The Have a Heart trap is large enough for the baby. If I can capture the small child, I may be able to chain him to a wall and draw out the rest of the family, at which point they will be ripe for the picking.

Does anyone have any other suggestions? I hear my dog Buddy barking downstairs. The attack as begun. Operation Demon Rat Destruction is underway.
--Cbake

*Simpsons reference