Rats or Cats Update

I had a conversation this morning with friends about the rats and cats situation here on base. My friends' neighbor had been ill for a couple of days and hadn't left her house, thus she hadn't started her vehicle. It seems rats chewed through the hoses in her car, rendering it inoperable, just like what happened to our neighbor's truck during his vacation. And the real kicker here is that this woman owns a cat! Evidently her cat doesn't enjoy rat cuisine, or perhaps the rats are so big and vicious that they're scaring the cats, thus the reason we find them, and/or the footprints they leave behind, on top of our vehicles. Or perhaps the cats and rats have become friends, a thought that has crossed my mind, especially after seeing this...

Further evidence...

I understand housing personnel are telling folks they need to at least start their vehicles daily, even if they don't drive them anywhere, just to ward off these pesky critters. I suggest people stop feeding their cats and they'll learn to love rat cuisine and actually do their jobs! And if they're going to hang around my house and leave their paw prints and scratches on my car, they could at least get rid of the dadgum rats! Okay, all you cat lovers out there... don't get your panties in a bunch. I'm only kidding... well, sort of.

Animals can be trained to do all kinds of things, right? Why can't we train all of these feral cats to take care of the rats around here?

This is what we have now... a bunch of losers, willing to just give it all up...
Here's my question... What do we do when we're going to be away from home for an extended period of time? We'll either be driving a vehicle or leaving it at the airport, but what about our other vehicle? What do we do with it? Leave it to be destroyed by the rats?

I actually googled "rats under hood of car" and I was amazed at the number of internet postings about this problem. Apparently rats roosting under the hoods of cars and causing major damage is quite a common occurrence. I was not aware of that. (See? A person can learn something new every day if he's open to it.) A few suggestions for getting rid of rats included...

1) RAT POISON (But then they could die inside your car motor and that could be a big mess),

2) MOTH BALLS (Some say those don't work and imagine the smell inside your vehicle!),

3) SONIC PEST DETERRENT DEVICES (Rats evidently hate the noise),

4) LEMON JUICE AND/OR PEEL (Things that make you go, "Hmmm..."),

5) CLOTH SATURATED with FOX or BOBCAT URINE (Um... WHAT?! And where would I obtain fox or bobcat urine anyway?)

and my personal favorite...

6) an M-16 (Probably not allowed in base housing... In fact, I'm SURE of it!)

Rats or Cats?

One of the first things we noticed upon moving here was the wide aluminum bands around the trunks of the trees, particularly the palm trees. I remember having a conversation with one of our neighbors about these strange bands, and he told me the purpose was to keep the rats out of the trees. I thought he was totally pulling my leg. He wasn't.


Seems there are some pesky little critters in the area that are drawn to the nuts in the top of the palm trees. I caught sight of one of these tree rats one night, but it was dark and I didn't get a good view.


This could be one of the gang right here, up to no good! Not only do these varmints enjoy the nuts in the palm trees, but word has it they also crave the rubber hoses and whatnot under the hoods of parked vehicles, especially ones that have been sitting for a while. Our neighbor went on vacation and when he returned, his truck wasn't operable because of this nasty little rodent's handiwork.

What can one do about these tree-lovin', rubber hose-eatin' rodents? Well, I have one word which seems to be the best suggestion... CATS! Now, I like cats well enough, but I'm really more of a dog lover. We haven't had the same problem with the tree rats that other folks have encountered, therefore I do not feel the urge to run out and adopt a cat anytime soon. Besides, there are plenty of them roaming around the base as it is.


This is where the cats around our house like to perch. Yep... right on top of my car, the one we just bought a couple of months ago! We find paw prints all over the hood of my car at least once or twice a week. I'm not particularly thrilled, but I have to wonder if the reason we don't have a rat problem is due to the fact that cats hang around here. Which would I rather have... rats or cats? Hmmm...

Outside right now...

I took a few photos outside today and wanted to show you this strange tree just beyond the fence line of our yard. It had ginormous leaves when we first arrived... Workers came a couple of weeks ago and trimmed the trees. Can you tell? I was hoping they'd cut this thing down and put it out of its misery, but no one seems to cut down trees in Spain... something about all of them belonging to the king.

Here's another strange, unattractive tree located on the side of our house, just outside our yard. It's not as homely as the other one, but it's hardly a tree I would choose to plant in my yard.

Seriously... are these the ugliest trees or what?

What do we have here?

Hmmm... looks like we got some mold goin' on. Joy.

I went to the mailbox for this?

I think I've told you before that getting mail is a very big deal here in Spain. First of all, mail is often very slow in arriving from the States, so the anticipation is enough to make me revert to biting my nails again. Secondly, mail is not delivered to our homes here, so we have to drive a couple of miles to pick it up. Not that a big a deal, I know, but it does require some effort on my part. Mail is also only delivered Monday thru Friday... no Saturday mail... and if you happen to receive a notice in your box saying you have a package to be picked up, you can only retrieve it during certain hours of the day (Something like 7:30-8:30am, 11:00am-1:00pm and 4:00pm-5:00pm). Again, not a big deal in the scheme of things.

But what is a big deal is when I drive to the mail center to pick up my coveted mail, only to discover there's just one measly envelope in my box, only to further discover it's not even for me... It's for the other family with the same last name. That's just wrong.

Product reviews

Thought I would share with you a couple of products I've recently tried for the first time, with much success I might add...

I noticed these in the commissary, and all I could think about were the delicious, mouth-watering cheddar biscuits from Red Lobster. I had to have some immediately! Instant gratification was the name of the game that day. I made them, and while they weren't exactly like the yummy biscuits at Red Lobster, they were still quite good and my boys even liked them, which was certainly a bonus. We will definitely be serving these for dinner again sometime.


Remember when I whined and complained about my ailing back a few posts ago? A friend had mentioned these Icy Hot patches to me, and I'd actually forgotten about them until I spied a box in the commissary. Again... instant gratification won out and I bought a box to bring home with me. I figured if they're good enough for Shaq, they're good enough for me! These babies are simply wonderful... very soothing and comfortable. And of course I find it humorous to say, "I'm on the patch."

There you have it... product reviews for the week. Take this information and do with it what you will... save it in your memory bank for future reference, or dump it as useless drivel. I'm just tryin' to provide a service here, that's all.

Basketball begins!

Saturday our boys played in their first basketball games here in Rota. Each of them is playing for the Lakers, however, they're in separate leagues because of the age difference. Is my husband, the die hard Celtics fan, happy that the boys are playing for the Lakers? Not so much... but it's intramurals and they won't play for the Lakers forever. He can get past it.


The little man's team won by one point, making for a very exciting game. He had an okay game, but needs to practice a bit on his dribbling skills as the ball was stolen from him nearly every time, but fun was had, and that's what's important, right? Never mind that we made him run laps for missing that shot. I'm just kidding!


To his credit, little man played some pretty good defense. Look at this defensive stance! See that kid behind mine? He's the reason we won the game. He made most of our baskets.


Big man rode the bench at the start of his game. He looks pretty comfortable there with his legs crossed, chatting with his teammates.


I have a feeling the reason sitting the bench was comfortable is because his shorts don't fit as they're entirely too big in the waist. His shorts were cinched up as tight as they could possibly be, but he continually tugged at them and fiddled with the drawstring throughout the game.


Of course he managed to finally untie the drawstring altogether, and thankfully it was toward the end of the game, because all he could do at this point was constantly pull up his shorts. His team got spanked by a team that is filled with older, more experienced kids. The only thing I have to say about that is... Why bother with skills assessment if you're only going to allow this to happen? Can anyone answer that question? All the kids know this team has the advantage, so they're intimidated and parents are upset. Gotta love kids' sports!

What do you think?

Here's an old Target ad from a few years ago. I came across this while searching for some old photos of my youngest son. What's the significance of this ad? Take a look at the next few photos and tell me... do any of these photos resemble the little boy in the ad? (Click on the ad or any of the photos for an enlarged view) Are they all the same kid? What's your best guess?










Okay, I'll come clean. The little boy in the ad is not my son. My son is shown in each of the following photos. Someone showed us the ad when it first came out and thought our kiddo looked very much like the little boy pictured. At the time, we could see a resemblance too. I never would have thought to have my kid pose for photos in an ad. I suppose he could have lots of money in a bank account by now. Oh well, his preschool photo is forever captured (at least for now) on the website of a photography studio where we used to live, however, the only money involved was when I paid for the photos we ordered. Hmmm... there's something wrong with that picture... no pun intended.