Here in Camp Meeker, it’s just another day

We are sitting amidst off the charts humidity for the season, drying off from thunderstorms, COVID rages unchecked (but none in the 95465! Knock on wood!) through the county, it’s the first day of the 13-4 fire and everyone from Monte Rio north is evacuated, and I’ve got my “go bag” sitting by the door. Just another day in paradise, uh huh, yes, it is so. If the wind holds, we will be looking back and laughing as we read this two weeks later. Please knock on wood that, uh huh, yes, it will be so. And I will prattle on about minutia in the sincere expectation that we will care about such things two weeks hence.

First order of business: your local Park and Rec Board has moved its meetings online. This has been going on since March, but I am just getting around to telling you about it courtesy of some gentle prodding. As we speak, the latest meeting just ended. If you want to go to the next one, go to www.campmeeker.org and follow the “Board Meetings” or “Agenda/Minutes” links.

In the agenda for any given meeting, you will find a GoToMeeting link. If you’ve done this before, you know how simple this is. If you haven’t, it’s a simple matter of downloading an app. If you don’t want to do that, when you click on the link there are choices where you can join via your web browser. Easy as pie! No excuses! (Although the dog DID eat my homework, honest!). Because I keep up with the excellent agenda and minutes posted from these meetings, I can stay up on the content even if I am not able to attend the meeting. You will be happy to know that Camp Meeker’s water system is considered one of the best in the state! Just ask my wife! Water is wealth! Water is life!

In other news, I’ve just had a very Camp Meeker adventure. I went to take a shower yesterday, and was rather startled to see that a mouse had found his way into my bathtub! This is a very concerning event, because where there is one…let’s just say that mice can be very fecund. So I rushed off to Occidental Hardware (also one of the best hardware stores in the state, right?) for some traps. Now I’m a guy who traps and releases spiders, but mice---different story. I got back from the store, and my mouse was still there. Now I knew he was trapped, because I saw him try to get out, and fail. I therefore baited a trap and put it in there with him. I expected a quick demise, so I sat back and waited. And waited. At length, I peeked in. There he was, Reggie the Rat, just laughing at me and my silly trap.

Okay, I thought. TWO can play this game. I thought I would let him sweat a bit and I went to bed. In the wee hours, I got up and took a peek: there was a wee tail curling out from the trap. Ah well, I thought: sic transit Reggie. Imagine my surprise when I went in in the morning and found the trap – empty! There was Reggie hunkering over the drain, still laughing at me and my delusions of adequacy. He had somehow licked the trap clean of peanut butter, relieved himself thereupon, and curled up for a nap – ON the trap! Some rat! And Charlotte might have spun in her web.

I had grown to respect this Reggie. I thought – urged on by my coterie of Facebook friends, following the tale in real time – I can do business with this rat. I will give him the territories of under the house and by the trash cans to do his earnings, as long as he respects and honors my boundaries and my family, who had spoken forthrightly against varmint infestation. (Caution: Irony alert).

So there I was, Tupperware in hand, ready to live-trap yon Reggie, thereby to grant him the boon of freedom, after a stern talking-to. Well, if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans. I nudged the useless trap out of the way to get a clear shot at Reggie, and wouldn’t you know it, that danged varmint zigged when he should have zagged – right into the non-proverbial jaws of the trap! I was stunned, and a little sad. Me and this little rat had gone on a journey together, he and I. So let not his life be in vain, and carry this forth with you: gather ye peanut butter while ye may. In the end, we’re all just dang varmints.