Templeton's Butt Was On Fire

After Templeton, my fat rat, threw the party of the year in my kitchen, I was so upset with him for keeping me up all night making a racket and leaving me a gigantic mess to clean.  I also never wanted to re-experience him banging on my bedroom door in the middle of the night.  Therefore, I was on a mission to kick him out once and for all.  However, I didn’t know that Templeton was extremely relentless, sneaky and cleaver at breaking in and destroying my stuff.  As a result, I would have to take all kinds of different measures to get him to leave.

Stuffing firewood
under the door 

Wood nailed under my door
and the right side of the door 

No matter how hard I tried to block one of his entryways into my house, he always managed to leave me puzzled about how he kept sneaking in, which means that he’s the smartest rat in the world.  For instance, I first tried blocking his new main entryway, the bottom of my front door, by stuffing firewood every night under the large gap.  Some nights he would get his friends to help him push the firewood out so he could barge in my house.  So I started wedging the wood tighter under the door.  Then he got smarter and started to squeeze through the side of the door.  It took me a while to figure this one out as I scratched my head every morning wondering how he broke in and destroyed my kitchen over and over again.  Fortunately, I also got wiser and I had a solid, wooden block nailed under my door as well as to the side of the door.  Ha!  Did that stop him? No way! 

Empty shampoo bottle

Templeton's holes
he made to drink
my shampoo

A few nights later after I thought that he could no longer get in, I was half asleep when I went into the bathroom and stumbled upon him drinking my shampoo.  The sight of Templeton’s muddy, mangy, fat body made me look like I got electrocuted; my eyes bulged out of my sockets, I sprung ten feet in the air and screamed in horror as he gave me a soapy grin.  I ran faster than I had ever run in my life back to my room and I didn’t dare come out all night.  The next morning, I discovered that my shampoo had a big hole in it and it was empty.  When I told my friend that Templeton must had been the cleanest rat in Bhutan, my friend laughed saying that he got an image of Templeton farting and burping bubbles. 

The mushrooms covering his rat hole

His first rat hole, which was under the mushroom
 in the above picture

For over a week, Templeton managed to stump my friends and I about how he was sneaking into my house at night.   I couldn’t believe how he had fooled us for so long.  He outsmarted us by chewing through my wooden floor under where a big mushroom was growing and he was using the mushroom as a flapping door to conceal his entryway (Yes! I have mushrooms growing through my wooden floors).  I know that he deliberately chose this spot because it was just too perfect.  His rat hole was discovered when the mushrooms started to grow too big and I had them removed.  I was shocked at how clever he was and I tried to show him whom was boss by having a piece of wood perfectly cut to fill in the hole.  For several days my house remained quiet and there was no evidence of Templeton.  It was heaven again!  Well, at least for a little bit.  

Just when I thought he was gone for good, one night I stepped into my hallway and heard a crash in the kitchen.  I knew that it was Templeton and I froze in fear.  Before I could bolt to the safety of my room, he ran faster than the speed of light acorss my feet, which caused me to scream bloody murder while I tried to climb up the wall.  Within seconds he vanished into a new whole that he chewed next to the old one, but of course not without flashing me his famous grin.  Still clinging onto the wall for dear life, I screamed, “You sneaky rat bag.”  Then I dashed to my room in case he heard me and wanted to show me who was really the boss.  

The stones I placed over his rat holes in my hallway

Every time I would block his new rat hole with a stone, he would make another one a few days later next to the old one as if he was saying, “ha-ha-ha you can’t kick me out with my sharp teeth.”  He was relentless!  Additionally, when he would sneak in, he always destroy something as though he was getting back at me for trying to kick him out, such as when he peed and pooped all over my extension cord causing it to malfunction.

Red Hot Chili - this is the mess that I woke up to

Furthermore, my neighbors said that they had never seen such a skilled rat being able to twist off tight lids and they questioned if he was a raccoon, but I explained that I had seen him with my own eyes and that he was a very intelligent rat.  He always seemed to amaze me when he could screw off the lids to the tightest containers, such as the lid to my olive oil that he drank.  Errrrr!   He impressed me the most when he twisted off a trickiest lid containing my chili powder, which he ate and scattered all over my countertop.  The only satisfaction that I got cleaning the mess was the thought of him having a burning butt later on.  Ha!

Templeton's  presents to me... Errr

The worst part of his adventures in my home was that he always left me little presents: rat poop!  He was shameless!  He pooped everywhere and anywhere.  I was reaching the end of my rope, constantly having to sterilize my kitchen every morning.  I was also becoming mentally exhausted from being woken up in the middle of the night from him screeching around my house.  I wanted him gone!

After complaining about Templeton to a couple of my friends, they told me different ways that I could make homemade rat traps to kill him.  However, in some twisted way, I kind of like Templeton and I didn’t want to hurt him.  Once I even had a dream that he was a cute hamster and I was petting him as well as adoring him.  I woke up knowing that somewhere in my heart I actually have a soft spot for him despite how I react to him like he is some kind of rat vampire.  Thus, I just wanted him to stop destroying my stuff, pooping in my house and waking me up at night.  He was exhausting! 

So I started to ponder how I could get rid of him in the most humane way.  After a few days of serious reflection, I realized that I had been going about the whole situation wrong.  For instance, I was constantly dreading/expecting Templeton to show up at night and that’s exactly what would happen.  I would carry my broom with me from room to room fearing that he was around the corner and sure enough he would appear.  Basically I was focusing all my thoughts and energy on what I didn’t want the most:  Templeton breaking in and destroying my stuff.  As a result, that is what I got.  Errr! 

Most of the time I am pretty good at manifesting what I want, which means sometimes I’m also pretty good at manifesting what I don’t want.  Yikes!  When I realized this, I changed my focus and started to pretend that Templeton had moved away and I was on my own.  Once again I forced myself to stop carrying my protection broom around my home and if I thought about Templeton, then I would quickly think about something more pleasurable like dancing carefree around my house as if there were no rats.  Within a few days of refocusing my energy, I finally manifested what I wanted:  Templeton was gone once and for all!

It has been weeks since he has moved out and in some strange way I kind of miss him, but not enough to have him come back.  I think that I mostly miss being able to write humorous stories about how he makes me go crazy.  However, I hope that all my thoughts about Templeton for this blog entry won’t attract him back.  Ahhh the art of manifesting can be a tricky game.  Wish me luck as well as Templeton wherever he is.