The Rats of Ormond and Dogs of Victoria

The poodle sized rats that were creeping through my house at night commando style, have finally vanished.  Their population dwindled almost immediately after the “rat man” sprayed his poison and laid baits; I don’t even hear them in the roof anymore.

That isn’t to say I’ve completely eradicated their smell, but I’m getting there.  I’ve become quite the rodent expert throughout this hellish time.  (Not exactly something you can put on your CV, but handy just the same!)  The house has undergone some serious cleaning and I have invested in so many “pure oils” that I could open an apothecary!  According to some of the websites I went to, pure peppermint oil on cotton balls scattered throughout the house stuffs up the sense of smell.  Theory is if you can’t smell you can’t hunt so the rats decamp.   I nearly decamped the first night and I kept waking up with my eyes watering I had splashed it around so much; I’m not quite as heavy handed now.

To diminish the “rodent” smell (which is a musty vile odour that lingers forever) you wash everything down in peroxide with pure orange oil (which is quite pleasant). 

So, odd waft of rodent aside, things are good.  Things are settling into “normal” at the Ormond House. 

What is normal you may ask…?  For me means, it means the house is always clean and tidy…    Things get put away when not in use.  Even better, I’ve corrected our lifestyle back to what it was pre the period of my life now known as the “Squeeze, Latent Serial Killer and the Harridan Phase”.

That small correction has seen me drop nine kilo so far this year – a sizeable chunk in anyone’s language and one that expands your wardrobe as the clothes that were pushed to the back of the rack because they were too small, circle through to the front again.

The only dark cloud at this minute in time is my finances; boy have they taken a bashing!   Rat eradication cost about $700 – and that is the one off cleaning and eradicating!  I live in fear of them coming back in another month or two when the pigs who live next door and are not fit to run a restaurant, let the place drop back to what it was. 

On top of the rat phase; is the dog phase – that is the bloody speeding fines!  We are talking less than 5 klms over here and we are talking several….  But hey, my Dad was dying and I was trying to get to appointments!  I sent a lovely letter to Victoria Compliance asking for a little compassion and leniency telling them that my Dad had died (and he was one of their own!)  I got a generic reply that basically said suck it up.  In truth, sending a letter to say “sorry to hear about your father, but suck it up” would have been passable.  Just to ignore his death as though it doesn’t count I felt was outrageous!  And I’ll be sending them another letter to tell them that!