For most of 2007-2008, your dad and I lived in San Diego, California. We were near the beach, the weather was always sunny and in the 70s, there were thousands of great restaurants (the Mexican food was prepared by actual Mexicans) and the shopping was world-class. All of the locals were always in a good mood, because of all that stuff in the previous sentence.
But you know who didn't like it there? Your dad.
Your dad and I would go to a hiking trail on the weekend, and if there was another car in the parking lot, he would launch into an impassioned tirade about how there were too many people in San Diego, and how everything was better in Montana, because you could actually go out in the wilderness and be alone. There's just something about humanity that gives your dad a rash.
Fast forward four years to this morning - Alberton, 7:30a.m.
After putting you in your car seat for the ride to school, I open the passenger side door and notice that the bag of Laney snacks I usually keep in the car has been gnawed into, with a granola bar partially eaten, and other evidence of a rodent invasion. Safe to say I am freaked out. This is not an ages-old farm truck that's been parked in the yard; this is a new Subaru that I will be making payments on 'til the end of time.
I decide to get in the drivers seat and take you to school (although I'm thinking that if we get out on the interstate and I'm going 75mph, and a mouse comes out from under my seat and tickles my toes, there's a high probability that we'll be sailing into the Clark Fork River). But the car won't start. Click click click click click. The battery's dead.
I leave you to your bagel & schmear and go hunting across the property for both a pair of jumper cables and your dad's old truck. I get everything into position to jump start the car, then I open the car's hood...
I was on the phone with Tex at the time (because your dad was still out in the boonies somewhere, and it's always a good idea to have someone on standby who can alert the authorities in case you electrocute yourself), and I think when I saw this, I shrieked something like, "Holy s#*!, a mouse has built a fortress in my car!"
Tex laughed and said, "I've never heard of such a thing! Take a picture!" After I cleaned off the battery with the plastic tongs from your play kitchen (sorry) and got the car running, Tex asked, "Do you think it had a bunch of babies in there?" but by that time, we were so late for school that I didn't have time to throw up.
I know I took the long way around, but the point of the story is this - San Diego might have had 3 million people, but it never had a mouse that built a dog hair haven under my hood.
I'm going to say we're even.
Love,
Mom
UPDATED TO ADD: Montana natives have since reviewed these photos and informed me that what I have on my hands is actually a pack rat. Consider me 8 times more skeeved out than I was before.
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