Monday, June 13, 2005

rats!

You want rat stories? Ok. So during my sophomore year of college, I slept over at my boyfriend's a lot because his dorm room was a two bedroom apartment. Mine essentially was too, only it had seven people living in it. (And yes, once upon a time I had a real, live boyfriend. I can't believe it either.) Anyway, sophomore year my insomnia was raging, and having two 6 foot tallish people in a twin-size bed wasn't conducive to helping me sleep, so sometimes I'd spazz out and go lie awake on one of the three couches in the living room instead. One fine morning, Ex-Boyfriend's roommate was leaving for crew practice and noticed some movement on top of the garbage can, which was situated next to the couch I was on, and hence next to my head. Apparently it was a foot-long rat, and it scurried off, nearly missing my head, when Roommate walked through the room. Miraculously, I was asleep for a few minutes and have no recollection of this event, nor any knowledge of where the rat had been spreading its diseases before perching itself a few inches away from my face.

4 comments:

P/O said...

wow, you take requests? nice! :)

i have a great (read: horrifying) central park rat story, but i'll spare you the details in your comments section...

Gina said...

no no, do tell! my comments section isn't exactly a bastion of deep intellectual discussion so you won't be interrupting anything...

P/O said...

ok, well, you asked for it... i'm totally going to post this over on my own blog--thanks for the inspiration! :)

so an ex-flame had been after me for some time to have a picnic in the park. and although i admit i tend to believe that the idea of a picnic is always inevitably better than its actual execution, i eventually relented and we decided to hit central park one beautiful early-summer evening (much cooler than the weather we’ve been having here lately) with a bottle of wine and some fairway-supplied goodies.

and perched on some rocks in the deserted and darkening sheep’s meadow, I had to admit it was pretty nice.

so as the sun went down (along with the level of wine in the bottle) we laid back and watched peacefully as lights came on in the surrounding buildings and bats circled overhead. well, i did, anyway. i love bats, and was instantly transported back to childhood summer nights spent with my brother floating silently in the blackened waters of our family’s pool, watching in fascination as bats swooped down and skimmed insects off the surface all around us.

the ex-flame was less than thrilled, but agreed to stay put as said bats were not exhibiting any outward signs of rabies.

at one point, i became aware of movement on the rocks next to us, and the ex-flame cooed, “aw, i didn’t know squirrels came out at night.”

i turned my head to look at the squirrel that was, at this point, just inches away from our heads, and said, “um, yeah. that’s a rat.”

that did it. with a screech the picnic was declared over, and we hightailed it home. i wanted to tell her that anyone who spends any time in the park in the evenings knows that the number of rats there far outnumbers the people who use it by day, but I decided to just keep my mouth shut.

Anonymous said...

ahhh - these are sick! :-)

this rat story is so gross I won’t even post it on my own site... back in the mid-90's I bartended at NoTell Motel on Ave A, next door was an animal store that specialized in selling rats both as pest and to the Boa owners in the EV. some of the rats that had escaped their cages and began living in the bar. the bar owners put poison down, but this didn’t seem to kill them, just made them move slower. so I’d be bartending and step on a rat (it's the sickest feeling you can imagine) and they were so slow you'd step on them a couple times as they moved out of the way. Some of them were all white. Writing about it now seems like a crazy nightmare - but it really happened. Let me tell you, stepping on a rat is something y'll never forget.

Gina - I love you're site :-) xo, cathy (cityrag.com)