Critter Comforts
The rats are going to kill us all.
Well, if you believe the peoples on my neighborhood listserve. They're calling for the Pied Piper of Adams Morgan, citing the alley behind my house as the filthiest place in DC where the little critters run rampant. Maybe it's because of the variety of weird trash left back there, including an excessive amount of abandoned gardening equipment. But there's no denying that there are a ton of rats in the hood- especially over by the ex-crackhouse at 17th and Euclid. I'm pretty sure I saw a rat king rolling through the debris last night.
A few months back, the peoples somewhere in Arlington were bitching about the feral cat colonies, and they worked with a group called the alley cat allies to neuter the kitties and control the population. Now, I've had cats for the better portion of my life, and it has been my experience that nothing makes kitty happier than killing a rat/bird/mouse/squirrel/speck of dust that may or may not present an imminent threat to humanity. Just look at what Jeff can come up with. Cats want to help us out (or possibly wait till we're sleeping and kill us and then take over the universe, but it's best not to think about that too much).
Why not import the feral cats? Cats eats rats, rat population decreases, peoples on neighborhood listserve go back to doing what they do best, namely, blaming Councilman Jim Graham for all the kids shooting each other in the street, then counting the typos in Councilman Graham's humble replies that call for action from the mayor. Order restored. It's not like Adams Morgan is Australia or something; you're not going to irreperably harm some flora-fauna balance. In fact, I used to see cats all the time in the neighborhood, sitting at the window and provoking my own kitty into a territorial hissing contest.
Except that I don't see the cats around anymore. And I think this is because the rats have actually gotten to the point where they're eating the cats. There's only one solution left.
Monkeys.
Seriously, who's gonna fuck with a monkey?
Ok, I know what you're thinking- that one deputy mayor got killed in a monkey attack.
Well, if you believe the peoples on my neighborhood listserve. They're calling for the Pied Piper of Adams Morgan, citing the alley behind my house as the filthiest place in DC where the little critters run rampant. Maybe it's because of the variety of weird trash left back there, including an excessive amount of abandoned gardening equipment. But there's no denying that there are a ton of rats in the hood- especially over by the ex-crackhouse at 17th and Euclid. I'm pretty sure I saw a rat king rolling through the debris last night.
A few months back, the peoples somewhere in Arlington were bitching about the feral cat colonies, and they worked with a group called the alley cat allies to neuter the kitties and control the population. Now, I've had cats for the better portion of my life, and it has been my experience that nothing makes kitty happier than killing a rat/bird/mouse/squirrel/speck of dust that may or may not present an imminent threat to humanity. Just look at what Jeff can come up with. Cats want to help us out (or possibly wait till we're sleeping and kill us and then take over the universe, but it's best not to think about that too much).
Why not import the feral cats? Cats eats rats, rat population decreases, peoples on neighborhood listserve go back to doing what they do best, namely, blaming Councilman Jim Graham for all the kids shooting each other in the street, then counting the typos in Councilman Graham's humble replies that call for action from the mayor. Order restored. It's not like Adams Morgan is Australia or something; you're not going to irreperably harm some flora-fauna balance. In fact, I used to see cats all the time in the neighborhood, sitting at the window and provoking my own kitty into a territorial hissing contest.
Except that I don't see the cats around anymore. And I think this is because the rats have actually gotten to the point where they're eating the cats. There's only one solution left.
Monkeys.
Seriously, who's gonna fuck with a monkey?
Ok, I know what you're thinking- that one deputy mayor got killed in a monkey attack.
New Delhi Deputy Mayor S.S. Bajwa was rushed to a hospital after the attack by a gang of Rhesus macaques, but succumbed to head injuries sustained in his fall, the Press Trust of India news agency and The Times of India reported.Fair enough. We cannot spare Councilman Graham as a friendly-fire casualty to satisfy the bloodlust of monkeys sent to do our bidding. We can't count on government; we can't count on the kitties, and we can't count on people to actually throw their shit a garbage cans. The situation seems hopeless, n'est pas?
Wrong, for yonder sits the Fourth Estate, and they are more important than them all.
Slate answers the question that plagues us more than the rats, and one that has plagued us for centuries: How can I defend myself when surrounded by a pack of angry monkeys?
So, problem solved. Now we can focus on the real issues facing the city, namely the gardening supplies in the alley. The back of my own building hasn't been a rodent problem so much as people abandoning weird, weird, chintzy garden types of stuff: At least a dozen decrepit rocking chairs, a rusted planter shaped to look like precious toddler overalls, life-sized wagon wheels, doll heads. And that's not stuff that was left there and then stayed a while- it's a rotating crop of rejected items that even handy tips from Real Simple couldn't save. My alley is the shabby-chic graveyard, which is much creepier and probably more disease-ridden than rats. I'm terrified to walk the streets at night for fear that a cadre of Martha Stewart-like zombies will force me into tatting holiday wreaths with them. Stabbing them with a knitting needle only fuels them; you'll just have to trust me on this one. It's not a good thing, crafting zombies.
Slate remains chillingly silent on the issue.
posted by The Goo at 9:38 AM
1 Comments:
Jeff is most pleased.
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