Oh man! Not again!!!

Quite some time ago I put up these posts about the 'uninvited visitors' in my house: a gigantic catfish that was found stranded at the back door still alive (as it 'knocked' the door with its tail) and a tiny domestic mouse that came to visit at nights and chewed my floor mat into small pieces. We have eliminated them the best way we can for the safety of everyone in the house (especially my baby porcupine who insisted we keep the mouse as cuddly pet... what???!!!!)

I thought our problem is over until last few nights when there came another unwanted and unexpected visitor 'checked-in' into our master bedroom to share the same space with us to live happily ever after.

A CIVET!!!!!

Image taken from forumjualbeli.com

  

The only different between us human and the civet is that we live in the room and it stays in the ceiling, right on top of us. We can hear it running here and there almost every night, starting at around 3 a.m. in the morning and would last for about a few minutes up to an hour before it disappeared to God knows where. I can't sleep during this time, for fear that this cunning animal might suddenly fall from the air and land straight onto my face.... On top of that, normally the next morning when we wake up, we'll be breathing in a room with this peculiar, nice smell of pandan leaves (pandanus amaryllifolius), a common plant we use to add nice fragrance and also green colouring in our cooking. It was the civet's urine that smells like pandan leaves! Masya-Allah!

I can't believe this! Our house is in the middle of a busy city. We have massive traffic jam in the morning and again in the evening. Constructions of new buildings are everywhere. The moment we open our eyes in the morning there will be many sources of noises from people's activities, vehicles, machines, etc., they're like music to our ears. Even when we retire to bed at night, we still can hear these noises. This is just to describe you how busy this place is. So where does this civet come from??? 

The more important question to think about is..... how do I get rid of it?

Another unexpected visitor!

Few nights ago I did not sleep well. My baby porcupine kept disturbing me on interval hours. At one time she wanted me to get her teddy for her as she can't sleep without it. So with both eyes shut, I climbed out of the bed and started searching for the missing teddy under her bed. The other time, she was singing softly right at my ear, just the way I used to do to make her sleep. so I told her I was already sleeping that there is no need to sing lullaby for me. When I tucked her in bed again, she complained that her finger is in terrible pain when in fact she has only a very tiny-miny bruise that is almost invisible. And finally, she asked for a bottle of milk...!  *sigh* I have to admit I was tired, but I never have the heart to scold this plumpy baby porcupine of mine, so, like it or not, I went downstairs to prepare the milk for her.

Naughty baby porcupine! She took her toys and drawings to bed and played alone when everyone else in the house was fast asleep. She was only asleep after a bottle of milk!

The moment I switched on the lights in the kitchen, I caught the glimpse of a mouse escaping through a gap under the back door. What!!??? A mouse in my kitchen??? Since when??? No! This can't be happening to me. I don't hate mice but I don't like them in my house either!

So the next day I told my husband of the discovery and we both agreed that mice could carry diseases and shouldn't be let into the house again.We were also worried that the mouse might have its offsprings somewhere in the house without us knowing it. So we bought a mouse trap to catch it. When night came, I put some leftover of a fried fish as bait in the trap and left it exactly in front of the gap under the door.

 As expected, the mouse made a night visit again into the kitchen and fell for the bait.













When morning came, the whole house, especially my baby porcupine, was so excited to see the mouse in the trap. The mouse was kind of cute. Yes, he's cute. *slap forehead* Not adorable, of course, but not ugly either.

Another problem arised. How to get rid of it? None of us were willing to kill it, so we handed it over to my maid to settle the problem. Later we went to work as usual and when we came back we never asked how she put an end to the poor mouse. I hope the problem is solved. Alhamdulillah. But the mouse reminded me of another unexpected visitor that once landed at the back door unknown to us how. I'll never forget that huge catfish!!!

Unexpected visitor

Rain has been heavy lately. There has been strong winds as well. I found the rain water dripping from a hole at the ceiling of my son's bathroom. Made a check. The roof is intact. No leak. It means no problem. But somehow water could still go through the tiny-miny holes in between the slates because of the strong wind factor. Need to do something about it before the water rip open the ceiling one day (sigh!).

But what I really wanted to share here is not about the ceiling, actually. The heavy rains and the strong winds brought a visitor stranded and trapped at the back door of my house. An enermous catfish..! Yikes! In a glance, it looked like a giant snake!

Where it came from, we really have no idea. Perhaps from the nearby drain. But the drain is too shallow for the fish to swim in. The rain water must have overflown a river somewhere and resulted strong current that dragged the fish along, threw it into a drain and left it stucked at my doorstep. Well, I suppose that's what must have happened. What else could I think of?

Bibik took all her energy to put the fish into a big basin (for God knows the fish was awfully heavy and slippery!), while the children shouted hilariously as if they were running away from Freddie Crouger on the Elm Street. The fish was still alive and we didn't know what to do. No way we are going to cook and eat it. Ewwwh!!! But we can't simply throw it away either...



After sometimes, we stopped an Indonesian passerby who was on his way back home from work. Offered the fish and turned him the happiest man in the world. You should see his BIG smile when he took the fish home.....

Oh! well...! Tak payah masuk pertandingan memancing pun, ikan datang menyerah diri kat rumah... Hahahaha! What an incident...!