what's the last thing you want to be doing on a sunny afternoon?

For me, it's going to have to be cleaning smouldering palm tree nuts and rat shit out of my car engine.

A little background information: I park my car (the steadfast '99 beige Contour lovingly referred to as ED) outside as my parents' cars get the garage. We have three palm trees in the front yard, Katie, Jenn, and Lorn are their names because when we were young (and oh so sweet) my best friend, her sister and I declared them to be arboreal manifestations of ourselves. We also have a colony of roof rats.

I myself have never seen the roof rats; I know Jerry has, and my dad found a dead one once. I only know of their existence because at 2 am they get especially frisky and run about merrily on the roof above my bedroom. They sound HUGE. Fuckin' huge. They eat palm nuts.

Not too long ago I had my car tuned up. When I went to retrieve her, I was promptly scolded by the repair guy for "letting the rats leave a nest in my engine." In my defense, I had no idea this was the current practice of our resident roof rats. My parents did, however, because it happened to the Cadillac (may she rest in peace) when it was parked on the street. A discussion insued as to how to halt the nesting instincts of roofus raticus but we reached no formal conclusion. I declined to have rat poison under the hood as I would be disgusted to have dead rat present in my car at any period in time. Parking it in the garage is not an option as leaving another car outside would subject it to a similar fate. Talks ceased, and life went on as normal.

Today I was blithely on my way to Hidden Valley Middle School to teach. The birds were singing. The sun was shining. The sharp, aromatic smell of wood fire was in the air. It remained in the air all the way up to Escondido, at which point I realized my engine was smoking.

The palm nuts were buring. It's a nice smell and all, but it's a little disconcerting to suddenly have your car turned into a giant incense burner without your prior knowledge.

So, instead of coaching (and let's all shead a tear for that 70 bucks that was not added to my checking account this afternoon), I spent the time scraping nuts, rat shit, and snail shells out of my engine. It was not pleasant, and I don't recommend it. For now, my car is parked across the street in the hopes that the rats will be confused and not be able to find it.

Ah, the trials of living.