I once heard a comedian say, “It’s a small world but I wouldn’t want to paint it.”  That thought bounced around in my head for the five hours it took me to clean the bus.  The Bluebird Hilton doesn’t look very big from the outside but it’s a bloody monstrosity to vacuum and scrub it to a sanitization standard that I can live with (in?).  I’ve tidied the converted school bus before, removed the cobwebs and given it a spit polish when company was coming.  The surface shine was enough for them…no offense to those people…but it had to be a little more pristine for it to become my lake residence, temporary as I hope it will be.  

Bleach and Febreeze are my NBF’s (new best friends), the place smells fantastic thanks to them along with the addition of some peppermint oil.  While we’ve never had mice in the bus it’s also been many years since there was any food in there to attract them.  Most residences at the lake are shared (unwillingly) by the nasty vermin and while we’ve been fortunate that they never found a way into the trailer we weren’t about to take any chances living in the Hilton.  I read that the potent oil confuses the rodents and they don’t like it so I applied it to cotton balls and tucked and stuck them in every hole and crevice I could find…in the bus.  I used an entire bottle and the place smells like gum…bleached gum…so even if it doesn’t keep the mice out at least it is a lovely scent.

My aunt has had lots of mice in her place…they always poop on her dresser as a kind of hello/fuck you.  She has tried everything to stop the disease infested defecators from getting into her trailer to no avail.  Last summer she finally resorted to placing mothballs around as apparently mice don’t like the smell of them.  The problem with that is that humans don’t like the smell of them either.  It’s taken her nearly a year to get the odiferous chemical stench out of her carpets, bedding and walls.  Even now when the wind blows just the right way we catch a whiff of the vile white pellets.  To add insult to injury the mothballs didn’t stop the rodents at all.  

Build a better mousetrap?  We did.  We take an empty pop can and smear it with peanut butter, we run a wire through the can (end to end) and attach it to the top of a five gallon bucket that contains about four inches of water.  The mice are attracted to the peanut butter (remind me to tell you the story of the girl whose dog is too) so they jump for the can which spins in some kind of bizarre mouse log rolling competition and the vermin then splashes down into the drink and is unable to get out.  They drown in the water when they become too tired to struggle.  I know it sounds inhumane but they are mice for fuck sakes and it’s really not much worse then the snap of a wire on their neck as they nibble a bit of cheese.  The reason we don’t use the bucket method (which is incredibly effective by the way) at the lake is because it has also been known to attract and kill a couple of our ground squirrels who are practically pets.  It’s hardly fair to feed the little guys peanuts out of hand and then lead them via peanut butter to a watery grave.

It was a cold miserable weekend weather wise.  It pissed down rain all Friday night and we awoke to a six degree celsius (42.8F) morning and fresh snow on the mountains.  It’s not gotten a hell of a lot warmer since then.  Right now it is 12 degrees outside and I am thinking about turning the heat on in here.  My poor kid on the other hand is perspiring like a fountain out in Ontario.  He says the humidex puts the temperature at over 40 degrees celsius(104F).  Thankfully at least his classes are air conditioned but his home is a sweat box.  He has a fan (besides me) but all that does is blow the sweat around.  He says before he can dry off after a cold shower he is already sweating again.  Where is the happy medium???  Where is the justice???  Where is the fucking sun???  Oh yeah, it’s in Ontario being wasted on those who can’t appreciate it.  

It is no surprise my son is not a fan of the humidity, he’s never really had to deal with it before.  Out here we don’t get anywhere near that kind of humidity (I could never deal with that musty damp smell) even on the hottest days it cools down significantly at night so relief is always only a few hours away.  I never complain about heat because we really get so little of it but I am pretty sure I’d go mental out east right now, total meltdown, literally and figuratively.

Tomorrow is Heiny’s birthday, the old fella is 41.  I gave him an early present on the picnic table the other day..it wasn’t cake but there was some swallowing…oooh too much info…but I also got him a Home Depot gift certificate in case the bruises on my backside were not evidence enough of my love.  The truth is both gifts are as much for me, I enjoyed the outdoor romp and he’ll use his gift card on cabin related purchases making it a win-win all the way around.  I love it when I can share his presents.  I am generous that way.

Speaking of my brilliant mate…

“I am feeling so disheveled.” he said several times the other day after we’d been landscaping.

“You look fine, why are you feeling disheveled?”  

“Because I shoveled too much.”

I should have known.