Bad Karma

I just KNEW there would be repercussions for poking fun at God's favorite nucking futjob Mel Gibson.

I knew it!

This has been the weekend from hell.

First off, it was Big Kid's driving weekend. He's gotten past the rehabilitative private lessons and into the main driving program. 8 hours of driving Saturday and 8 hours of driving Sunday on a specialized course with 15 or so other student drivers.

And a two-hour drive to get him there and back from the mountains twice each day.

Luckily, he did very well, despite the fact that he FORGOT to take his night meds on Friday night. We had to jiggle everything around at 5am on Saturday so that he wouldn't have some sort of freakalicious anxiety attack in the middle of the skid pad course (simulates icy roads).

About 3am Sunday morning, Little Guy heard the dogs growling. He got up to investigate and heard something knocking around in the kitchen. He looked in the fridge. Nothing. He looked in the freezer. Nothing.

He opened up a cabinet and eek! There was a mouse with it's tail caught in a trap flopping around. So what did he do? Closed the door and went back to bed.

Around this time of year in our rural area, the nights start getting really cold and voles (otherwise known as prairie mice) begin to try to find warm places to nest. A week or so ago I noticed some suspicious activity, although I couldn't find any poops anywhere. I stuck a trap in one of the cabinets. And a bunch out in the garage.

Anyway, when he got up in the morning (Hubby had gone to take the Big Kid down the mountain to driving class), Little Guy started making himself some cereal.

"You'll never guess what happened last night!" he said conversationally.

What?

"I saw a mouse in the cabinet."

WHAT? Was it dead?

"No, it's alive." I went and looked. Sure enough, there was a little mousie flopping around with the tip of it's tail caught in the trap. Yikes.

I stuck a tupperware container over it and weighted it down. Hubby set it free when he got home---100s of yards from the house.

So because we had to drive back down the mountain to pick up Big Kid and the other car that afternoon, Hubby had to miss his football game. We taped it, but there was much grumbling involved. We couldn't even listen to the radio just in case they announced the scores at any point. Oh joy.

Later in the evening when hubby watched the game, there was much hollering and yelling. We lost.

About 8:30 last night, we were talking about packing it in---everyone was exhausted. The big dogs were outside barking at something and Little Guy went to open the back door to call them in.

He opened the door, and then closed it. He turned to us and said "eww".

Then it hit us. A stench so bad that our eyes started burning immediately.

Everybody is probably familiar with the nasty smell of skunk when it's farther away. Up close and personal, it has an almost chemical-smelling quality that is similar to the smell of tires burning.

We thought something was on fire. Hubby grabbed the flashlight and ran outside. He touched Charlie, our large mutant yorkie, and she was sort of wet. He looked around the back area, in the garage and the front. I searched every room in the house to close windows and see if anything was burning (electronics, etc).

Nothing. Hubby came in and asked me to smell his hands. His entire smellavision system had shut down.

The perplexing thing was that his hands smelled like burning rubber.

I called the neighbors on both sides to ask if they would come out and tell us if they smelled something. No one was home. So we broke down and called the sheriff's department, which also is in charge of animal control. When hubby told them we couldn't tell if it was skunk or some kind of chemical fire, they sent the fire department.

More joy.

So we had 6 firemen walking around our yard all suited up and with flashlights at 9:30pm. They found the spot.

Apparently the dogs decided to mess with a little black cat with a stripe running down it's back. Charlie got the brunt of it---so did the corner of our house, where there was a big greasy gawd-awful smelling spot. The big dog was luckier, but she still got some on her.

After the fire squad left, we had to figure out what to do with the dogs. The stores in our little burg close early on Sundays, and we weren't quite sure what to do. Couldn't leave the dogs out overnight, because it's too darn cold. Didn't want to let them in, because they'd ruin the carpets and furniture if they rolled around on them.

We tried to wash Charlie---5 times, in fact, but it just spread it around. That stuff is G R E A SY!!! We finally just rolled up the rugs, moved the dog's crates close to the back door and locked them in overnight. Tossed them outside first thing in the morning, and have been airing the house out.

Got a call this morning that since we used the word "chemical" in our report to the sheriff's department, they put it out on the wire and we may have some follow up. Got to round up all those meth labs, you know.

Double joy.

I guess it's true about Karma. This time the stank's on ME!

But in for a penny, in for a pound. I'll leave the comments open for a couple of more days on my previous post and do a big pimpin' stank post later in the week.

Hope you guys have a fabulous week!