Cheese...

Something smells… and it’s not the neighbors spreading cow manure on their field. Some people have accused me of having overdeveloped senses but let’s just say I am observant. So if it’s a hawk/owl perched perusing the chicken coop or a new jack in the pulpit roadside, I take notice.

My children and students swore that I had eyes in the back of my head but I think that’s a Mother thing, don't you? I usually wish that I didn’t hear as much as I do as in TMI (too much information) in a classroom or the birds’s deafening 4 am morning cacophony when I’d like to wring their little necks since 5/5:30 is an early enough wake-up call. The packs of coyotes that run through the valley with a full moon can also get unnerving as Romeo starts howling with them. And Natureman sleeps right through it all. He has also called my sense of smell too sensitive. I can smell a sour rag before it would bother most people, when a cake/bread’s done, the earthy smell of spring... You get the idea, a bit 'too' attuned. So when we returned to a warm, closed up house after being gone all day Memorial Day, I started opening windows as soon as I walked in. We were promised cooler evening temps and I guess I had gotten a bit too much sun. The stuffiness was alleviated but there was a smell...How could that be? We had visited the dump on Saturday before heading out of town so how could something smell so bad in one day? OK, it was hot on Sunday so I decided to remove the kitchen garbage and place it in the garage if it was the culprit. House fans were flipped on as was the kitchen exhaust fan. Was the smell coming from outside and wafting in? I put my sniffer to work but alas I couldn’t find the source. I got diverted, forgot about it, went to bed and when I awoke I was relieved to not find the smell in the kitchen... but it seemed to permeate in the entrance hallway. I was leaving and would have to search later. Upon my return Natureman met me, anxious to share some news…(See now I knew it was bad since he smelled it too!) Natureman had found the source of the smell. Nope it wasn’t in the furnace room but as he moved the entranceway table near the door to the garage, there was the mousetrap with its victim who had been held captive long enough to start smelling. Yuckola.

I am really glad to know where that mouse trap had disappeared. You just never know why things disappear in the End of Rainbow Valley. I'm so glad that I had set the 'Better Mousetrap' with peanut butter, not cheese...