The Source

 Ron had arranged a pickup at about 9, which meant, if I did my God Time, I had to get up at about 7.  I did that, but I did hit the snooze a couple of times. 

I took my shower and got dressed, then did the Bible Study portion of my God Time.  I looked out the front window to a mountain of old furniture and garbage out in front of my house, where it meets #2's property. 

#2 was doing a dump and trying to make it look like my stuff.  I went out and looked.  Yup, a bunch of old garbage no one would want.  A broken plastic kid-sized toy car, some old furniture, a ton of dresser drawers....full of rat poop. 

If you are a long time reader you remember the rat problems I had after this guy moved in.  Thankfully I had the black cat you see in the slideshow.  He was a rat murderer.  He used to bring me a couple a week, for a while.  Usually dead.  Sometimes not, which made for very interesting blogs! 

The guy is a hoarder and wasn't even throwing out his trash for a while, it was scattered all over the yard.  I finally got advice to contact the health department.  They came out and wrote tickets.  He didn't clean up.  They came out again and wrote more tickets.  He cleaned up, somewhat.  I also contacted his landlady, who came out and did an inspection.  I could hear her screaming as I sat  inside my house. 

I knew he was bad.  I didn't know he was The Source.  But there was the proof for all to see, dresser drawers, all of them, all filled with (conservative estimate) a half cup rat poop each. 

And I was going out to breakfast with Ron.  I debated my choices.  This guy had so much crap on the curb I wasn't sure the garbage men would take it all.  I didn't want all that rat shit (sorry, literal term) in front of my house making me look bad. 

I'm messy.  I'm cluttered, but I'm not filthy and I don't have rats. 

I decided I would call the landlady again if the trash didn't pick it all up.  She really ought to know that apparently they had big rat issues in the house. 

On the one hand, I feel sorry for her, but on the other she only ever made an inspection when I asked her to.  You can't be a careless landlord.  Just because someone seems nice and pays the rent doesn't mean they are up to your standards of tenancy. 

I went back in the house. 

We got a call that our ride was arriving shortly.  I looked outside to see a Mexican woman in a black compact car parked in front of my driveway, looking at the plastic toy car. 

"Rats!"  I told her "Full of rats!  You don't want it!"  She backed up.  I told her we had a ride coming and she needed to move.  She circled the block until we left, and then took the broken plastic toy car.  I wouldn't want rat feces around my kids, or grandkids.  I guess she didn't care, or figured she could clean it up.  Ew.  Poor kid's probably going to end up with plague or hantavirus. 

We had a fairly straight trip out to the BBQ place.  We had to pick up someone at Hong Kong Market.  She shoved a jackfruit in my face and told me to smell it.  I wasn't impressed, but I made the appropriate yum yum noises. 

We dropped her off at Dollar Tree (I would worry about the produce getting warm, but she didn't),and finally went on our way. 

We had a good meal, and didn't wait too long for our pickup.  It was the same driver.  However, since we finished early (not that early, maybe 10 minutes), dispatch said we would have to wait outside some woman's home.  Fine.  I wasn't happy to hear that meant we would wait almost an hour because, "She's never ready before her pickup time" per the driver.  Ron had to use the bathroom so they made a big production out of calling the other client and "getting permission" (What the heck!? I have NEVER heard of that!) to leave to take us home.  We were only about 5 minutes away, round trip.  The driver would have been back with plenty of time to spare, before her pickup.  They (dispatch) were worried she would think he had "left her" and wasn't coming back.   Since when do they care about that? 

Well, after waiting in front of your house for almost an hour, at noon, we certainly should have been able to leave.  She was only going to the mall, anyway. 

We finally got home. It had been so long since my meal I decided to wait on taking my pills.  I took a nap and woke up when the trash came by about 1:30.  I listened.  They took a good long time in front of my house, which meant, I hoped, they were taking it all. 

I got up and looked.  Yes, they did.  I found it funny they left his garbage can in the middle of his driveway, so he'd have to get out of the car to move it. 

I went ahead and put my garbage can away, then went back to bed for an hour.  Tomorrow will be pretty crazy so I want all the rest I can get. 

I'm doing a load of laundry and I plan to go to bed early, God willing.  Right now the #6 kids are outside playing, but they generally wrap it up around dark. 

If not, I'll just lie in bed and endure.  Won't be the first time.