ROUS In My Wall!!!!

See that corner down there in the first picture?  We discovered earlier today that there is an animal trapped somewhere behind that corner.  You could hear the little creature back there scratching away trying to escape.  It was quite a scene in my garage this morning with five rodent shy females wielding hammers, fly swatters and umbrellas, staring at the wall wondering what to do next.  The man of the house who would typically handle all rodent related issues is, well, not here.  What's a mom to do? Find out what this mom did by looking below at picture #2.

I used my weapon of choice to knock a hole in the wall.  It was super easy and surprisingly fun.  Never once while swinging did I stop to think about several important things.  First: This is not my house, it's a rental.  Our hard nosed land lady will be laughing all the way to the bank with our deposit.  Second: Lee is probably going to give me "that look" when he sees this.  Third and maybe the most important thing (which Caitlin voiced mid swing): What am I gonna do if a rabid squirrel hurls himself out of the hole and attacks my face?

There's my handiwork.  Turns out I hit the wall where there is alot of insulation and a pipe of some kind.  I peeked in but Mr. Rodent was no where to be found.  After I knocked the hole in the wall, the creature stopped scratching.  This caused a small panic among the  Brown girlies. The conversation sounded a bit like this: 

A: Oh no what if it died? Mommy you scared it to death!

G: Ahhhhh the poor thing.

C: Ah man if it died it's gonna start stinking. (Followed by gagging noises) Our house is gonna stink like the J's house.  UGH!!!   

H: Mommy,  daddy's gonna freak when he sees that hole!

*** The J's are friends of ours who just moved across town.  While packing, the hubby decided to put the contents of their meat freezer into an extra suitcase because they were out of boxes.  The movers put said suitcase into their new closet and all was forgotten for about 2 weeks. UGH!!!!!

As best as I can figure, Mr Rodent got in through that dryer vent right there.  The thing is, it's 10 feet off the ground!  Can a critter scale a wall and get in through something that high? All I know is that I am now regretting my decision (months ago) to remove the grate that covers that hole.  It kept getting clogged with lint and keeping the dryer from doing its job. We kept having to drag the ladder out there and clean it out.  I say we but Lee did it the first time and at that point I said he should leave the grate off so that we won't have to do this again.  He said (remember this because I am humbling myself here) "No it needs to be on or an animal will get inside" I'm hanging my head for not listening.  The next time it clogged up Lee was at sea and I dragged the ladder out in the middle of the freezing night and cleaned the vent.  All the while grumbling and swearing that the grate was staying off because I was NOT going to do this again!

Here's a little perspective on just how high up that hole actually is.  I called the land lady and of course she was unreachable (she always is).  I left her a message and then called the emergency #.  Can you believe, no one answered the emergency # either?!    Several HOURS later she called me back and left a message on my machine saying that animals stuck in walls was not an emergency.  Hmmmm.  I'm not sure how to respond to that.  It has now been a full day and still no sign of the Rodent Of Undetermined Size.  We think he might of had a heart attack when I started hammering.  

I guess my next step will be to buy a case of Febreeze and sign up for the Home Depot class: 

How to repair the drywall in your rental house 101.