Rat Showing

So we have been trying to sell our home in the Heights for over a year now. Living in a "staged" home with kids and pets in the interim has not been easy, as you can imagine.

Last night we had a home showing scheduled by some prospective buyers who wanted to visit the house for a second look...this time with their mother.

For obvious reasons, this impelled me to clean twice as thoroughly as normal. I aired out the house and went into combat mode against the tumbleweeds of dog hair, imbedded wads of marshmallow bits and the mysterious lumps of unspeakables hiding under every rug.

After that, I did not want kids or dogs to even breathe in our home. I quickly loaded up the car with my sons, a permanent play-date, the frogs, two large dogs and six massive cinnamon rolls. And a bag of dirty dishes.

We spent the next five hours away from home at the science museum. When that closed, we invaded a neighbor's house, raided her refrigerator and messed up her home for the remaining two hours.

When we finally returned to our own home last night, I walked into the basement and immediately saw the one item I had overlooked in my panic to evacuate. Well, actually two items...the boys' pet rats. There they were, sitting on the gleaming basement kitchen counter as if they had been tenderly placed there as some sort of urban living decor. In my haste, I had forgotten to grab them and throw them in the car with the kids, frogs and dogs before we left.