Abe Lincoln in the Walls
B has logged on.
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J says:
must be nice to get to work at noon
B says:
good morning, dick
J says:
and don't go telling me about some fictional "time difference"
J says:
these "zones" people keep telling lies about
B says:
whoa... time travel! what's next? a trip to MARS???
J says:
i thought maybe we'd start with a ... space station? no ... russians are doing that. i know! we'll colonize the moon
J says:
which is, you know, sort of like Iraq.
J says:
without the people
B says:
oh, so you mean afghanistan?
B says:
kind of like iraq, without the people?
B says:
are you not speaking to me anymore because i called you "dick?"
B says:
i didn't mean it.
i hear it's c-c-c-cold out there.
J says:
uh, yeah. very
J says:
a 4 block walk from the metro = not fun
B says:
howzit taking the train to work in all that cold?
J says:
dood. i read your mind
B says:
i see you're one step ahead of me, as always
J says:
i'm, like, psychic. or psychotic.
J says:
Lol. that guy.
B says:
hey i meant to tell you...
B says:
i'm not allowed.
J says:
Hehe. L frequently says "but i am le tired"
B says:
she's a smart one, that wife of yours.
B says:
you're one lucky guy.
J says:
indeed. a whip, i tell ya
J says:
S is not amused.
B says:
well, she was amused the first 3K times she heard it...
J says:
it was that 3001st time that probably did it
B says:
like the proverbial straw.
J says:
little hint
B says:
uh, yeah?
J says:
avoid proverbs that place your spouse/partner in the role of a large, possibly hump-backed, not-terribly-cute, mammal
B says:
got it. that's a really good point.
B says:
how do you spell "i" as in...
i, i, captain.
B says:
aye?
B says:
iye?
J says:
aye
J says:
you need to watch more pirate movies
J says:
oh, i forgot to mention our excitement this morning
J says:
we have a critter living in our vents
B says:
ha! my friend C. just found a dead rat in their wall
J says:
a little after christmas, we heard some scraping near the vent in our bedroom (which runs from our bedroom across the guest bedroom into the kitchen/laundry room)
B says:
he'd been accusing his wife of "gassing it" until they realized it must be a dead animal somewhere...
J says:
ugh. how'd they find it? break down the wall?
B says:
yeah, fortunately it was in an area where he could vaccuum out of a hole in the wall. started vacuuming and sucked up a ton of dog food that had been hidden there
B says:
then *thwok*
B says:
there went the rat
J says:
eww.
B says:
eww!
B says:
so what's your story? in the wall. scraping...scratching...ghastly noises abound?
J says:
well, you know we have those crazy loud upstairs neighbors, who don't sleep (the Cement Feet People)
J says:
so when we first heard the noises, L. said that it was a critter ... i listened (we were in bed) and said "no, it's the guys upstairs - they must be trying to put in some cable or something"
J says:
b/c it sounded like they were running cable through the walls. this was just after christmas - figured they got some sort of big present
J says:
anyway, we heard it briefly a few more times
J says:
but it never really lasted and was hard to determine what it might be
J says:
until this morning
B says:
uh huh
J says:
i come back from the kitchen where i made some coffee
J says:
and L. is sitting up in bed with this look on her face
J says:
and i listen .. .and there's that noise
J says:
so she jumps up, grabs a flashlight and a stepstool from the kitchen, and gets up to look in the vent in the upper corner of the bedroom
J says:
the light flashes down the vent
J says:
and we hear a distinct sound of something running away
J says:
so i grab the light and the stool ... go to the laundry room and shine the light down that side
B says:
oh no!
J says:
and it runs back towards the bedroom
B says:
ah!
J says:
really clear to hear, b/c the vent system is that metal stuff
J says:
so we were listening to it move around for like 10 minutes
J says:
and i didn't want to tell L. ...whatever it is it's not small enough to be a mouse
B says:
gross!
J says:
no kidding
J says:
and another weird thing
J says:
you know chipmunks, which we are plagued with
B says:
big cheeks
J says:
the way they seem to move is front paws, then back paws,
B says:
right. like a racoon.
B says:
sp?
J says:
as opposed to front left, front right
B says:
yeah
J says:
ok, this thing made moving sounds like:
J says:
click, clack, click, clack
J says:
e.g., individually asynchronously moving feet
J says:
rather than two at a time.
B says:
the thought of this thing having nails on it's feet is really grossing me out
J says:
uh, yeah
J says:
and it def. has some nails
J says:
get this ... vent system is in our ceiling, which means the upstairs neighbor's is prob. on the floor, right
B says:
yah
J says:
and somehow they prob. share ...it sounds like this "thing" is moving between ours and the neighbors
J says:
and it sounds like it is getting into the neighbor's walls or into their apt.
J says:
i don't think it's coming into ours... b/c climbing back up into the system would be a major pain in the a$$
B says:
uhg
J says:
at one point, when it knew someone (me) was looking for it, it sounded like it scrambled up something ... and *slipped* ...
J says:
it fell with a *bang*
B says:
oh no
J says:
so i'm thinking it tried to climb up into the neighbors system ... was a little frantic, and slipped
B says:
i hope it broke its mangy little neck
J says:
these are things that dissuade me from believing it's a chipmunk
B says:
sounds more like a monkey
J says:
and no, it didn't. silence for about 30 seconds. then moved up
B says:
uh huh. monkey.
J says:
little pigmy monkey
B says:
ooo, ooo, ooo.
ahh, ahh, ahh.
J says:
or, you know, a minature Abe Lincoln. Shrunk and sent through time?
B says:
man, that'd be AWESOME
J says:
My fellow Americans
J says:
Four score
J says:
maybe when folks come over to our house tomorrow
B says:
hehehe
J says:
Nat can do a search and retrieve mission
J says:
this has me a little freaked, b/c if it is a rat
B says:
they'll have to put up with the g'berg address...
J says:
uuuuuu.
J says:
lol. right.
J says:
"would you knock it off Abe? ...or i'll send you back to the 'theatre'"
J says:
"no. not ford!"
B says:
are you kidding????
pack it up in a shoebox and take it on the road, baby!
J says:
"dance, abe, dance!"
B says:
hahaha
B says:
okay, so this story is killing me, did you ever catch the little creature
J says:
no man, this was this morning
B says:
this morning?
B says:
holy crap
B says:
and this things been living there since xmas?
B says:
it must be hungry!
B says:
it's gonna get you guys
B says:
for sure
J says:
that's why i'm figuring it must be getting into an apt. or outside
B says:
gross.
J says:
but i haven't seen evidence of it getting into ours
B says:
you gotta get some kinda animal control over there
J says:
i called the landlord this morning
J says:
immediately
B says:
good idea
J says:
and he was going to call the condo folks
B says:
man that is totally scary
J says:
it occurred to me
J says:
that it could also be a household pet
B says:
imagine what kind of creature it might actually be
J says:
like a lizard
B says:
oh no!
B says:
a lemur
J says:
a potbellied pig?
B says:
a fox-tailed platypus
J says:
a hairy-toed lemming
B says:
a spiney-toothed leapfrog
J says:
a pinko soap box turtle
B says:
a swarthy-bearded literature student?
J says:
no. they're allowed in the house
B says:
....
Posted by Jason at January 16, 2004 12:17 PM
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