The Rat Pack (Not Frank and Sammy)

    This is the country.  Not Los Angeles, California.  I live here.  Name’s Tuesday (not Weld).  Crime Scene Investigator.

     December 28, 2013.  Victims leave home for holiday time with family.

     December 30.  Victims return home, pull into garage.  Wife says, “Uh oh.”  Husband says, “Hmmm?”  (Just the facts, Ma’am, just the facts.)

      “The north door is open.”

      Signs of strong winds, Styrofoam blown about garage, paper stuff scattered around from recycle bin.

      Husband says, “Must not have latched it good when I closed it.  Strong wind blew it open.  Will have to set mouse traps.  Shet de do’.”

      Victims briefly inspect premises for signs of break in.  Finding none, enter house proper, find nothing amiss, unload car and proceed with life.

      December 31, Husband leaves garage doors open all day, removing satellite dish and bird feeder from piling post and mounting aforementioned articles on newly covered support post.

      Piling posts must not be meant to stick in the ground.

    December 31st still, 5:30 p. m.  Victims enter car and back out of garage.  Check engine light flashes on.  Husband exits car and opens hood.

    “A rat’s nest on top of the engine!”

     “How do you know it’s a rat’s nest?”

     “My mistake.  A pile of bits of tissue, string from a nearby frazzled rug, pieces of plastic sack stuffed compactly into a recess in the intake manifold between left valve cover and throttle body-air cleaner assembly.  Looks like a rat’s nest.  Two wires cut in two.  Looks like they have been bitten, not a clean cut like a wire cutter or a pair of pliers would do.   Hard, black plastic vacuum line also severed.  Looks like same tool that got the wires got the vacuum line.”

      Car runs ok.  Victims proceed with New Year’s Eve plans. 

      January 1, 2014, 10 a. m.  Husband inspects garage for signs of pack rat.  Finds gnaw marks on door frame.

    January 1, 12 p.m.  Husband takes pickup to town to borrow live trap from neighbor.

     January 1, 1 p.m.  Husband baits trap with grapefruit with a hole gnawed in it  (have to move items stored in “walk-in refrigerator” to rat-proof boxes), carrot tops, pieces of bread with peanut butter on it.

     January 1, 2014, 2 p.m. Husband patches one set of wires, uses jumper cord to complete circuit on second severed wire, replaces eight inches of hard black plastic vacuum line with three feet of hard black plastic vacuum line from spare parts in garage.

     Left of picture, coiled white wire equal jumper cable where dirty rat left not enough wire to splice.  Center of picture, black circle equal excess hard black plastic vacuum line connecting cruise control to intake manifold.  About 2 o’clock on excess vacuum line equal two wire nuts splicing other severed electrical wire, ending in plug just below 12 o’clock on hard black plastic vacuum line.

      January 1, 6 p.m.  Victims take car, running fine but check engine light still glowing, to go to neighbors to eat and watch football.

     On return home, husband opens garage door, Wife says, “The carrots are gone!”

     “From the ice chest?!”

     “No, from the cage.”

     Husband says,  ”[Expletive deleted] I forgot to open the pickup hood!” Wife proceeds into house.

     Husband opens pickup hood, runs to yell through house door, “Come help me.”

     Wife returns to the garage.  “What do you want?”

      “The rat’s in the pickup engine compartment!  Back the pickup out while I watch to see he doesn’t jump out.”

     Wife gets in pickup, starts it, pickup dies.  Wife starts it again.  Pickup dies. Wife starts pickup again, “puts her foot in the fan”, pickup screams.  Wife lets off accelerator pedal, puts it in reverse, pickup jumps back and dies.

       Husband says, “Here let me do it.  You see he doesn’t get out of the pickup until I get the pickup outside.”  Husband hands Wife the hoe he has been holding while on sentry duty, and gets into the pickup.

     Husband starts pickup and holds accelerator down enough to keep pickup running but not screaming, and backs it out of the garage.   Rat is apparently still aboard.  Husband shuts garage door, opens hood again, props it up with 4X8 block with rat bait attached.

       

     Husband rebaits live trap with carrot tops, using specially designed tool that came with trap. 

     (The tool is the stick with the laundry soap cup attached by blue tape--gets the bait over the pedal that springs the trap without springing the trap.)  If there’s one rat, there may be two.

    January 2, Victim checks rat trap, finds bait gone, door gaping wide open. As it is 6 a.m., it is still dark, victim baits trap with carrot pieces yet again and retires to fireside and the computer.

      9:30 a.m.  Victim finds carrots gone again and door to trap door still open.

     11 a.m.  Takes car to mechanic shop to see if he can get jumpered wire a permanent fix.  On the way, check engine light goes out.

     Stops at hardware store for wiring pliers and terminals, two different kind of rat traps, not the kind kind.  At this point a certain amount of malevolence directed at rat, who deserves whatever he gets.

      Returns to repair pickup (still sitting outdoors) wires. 

      Steel wool wrapped around wires deters them a little bit.  Repairs completed, pickup starts, runs and idles normally again.

       Victim finds tall cottage cheese container and sets on live trap pedal-door tripper.  Pours water into the cottage cheese container until trap door goes bang!  Empties water out and door won’t stay open.  Dump more water until door just barely stays open.  Rebaits trap with carrots.  Also, with evil chuckle baits two spring traps.

       The black thing is a jaw with nasty teeth.  Heh, heh.  The carrot goes down beneath the lower jaw where the rat can’t reach it, but when he tries. . .!

     7:15 p.m. Victim leaves Wife in the house and heads for barbershop—singing, not haircut.

     10:45 p.m. Husband returns, enters garage to hear a rattling in the live trap.  He opens the door into the house and yells, “I got him!”

     “I know, I opened the door to put some stuff in the recycle bin and I heard the door come down.  I must have scared him.”

    Did they get the right rat?  For two days, the carrots remain in all traps, the traps unsprung.

      On January 2, 2014, the dirty rat received two hours prison time and was released with unsupervised probation.

     The names have been withheld to protect the weak of heart (who stand to be victimized again).

     Dump-de-dump-dum-duuuumb.

    

(Comment:  Now you know what’s wrong with our justice system; the dirty rat was housed, fed, and turned loose to commit mayhem on another innocent car’s wiring system when he should have had an 85-cent shotgun shell expended on him.)