Dear Laura
I’ve also met some nasty smells from time to time, and partially-decomposed mouse behind the fridge is definitely not conducive to a healthy appetite. But there are worse! How about four fresh chickens forgotten in the office fridge over a long weekend when the earth leakage has tripped?
On Monday morning I got there first and managed to dispose of the abominable carcasses and most of the congealed blood before I puked. Then Sally took over and washed the fridge out with vanilla essence – it’s amazing what you can do with that stuff! I have since developed a technique for most residual smells. You put a goodly splodge of vanilla essence into a pan of water and boil it like mad with the lid off. It works like a charm. Of course, you have to get rid of the dead mouse first, otherwise you will spend the rest of your life boiling vanilla!
As for your other unwanted visitors, lizards are perfectly harmless but geckoes tend to hide behind pictures and soil the walls. They also scare the living daylights out of maids, which sometimes results in pictures being dropped and glass smashed.
Ants come in all sorts of varieties. The biting ones in the garden can be deterred with hot, soapy water and the little ones in the kitchen won’t cross a barrier of lemon juice or baby powder. Ant traps do work, but they take some time to be effective.
The presence of little piles of soil doesn’t necessarily mean that you have termites. They could equally as well be Argentinean ants, which are much easier to get rid of. I’ve used ordinary ant poison quite effectively and, when I didn’t have any of that, sent the whole lot to oblivion with a few squirts of aphid spray.
But if you have reason to think they might be termites, call the landlord immediately. Those things work fast. I once watched in fascinated horror as a small army of them took less than four minutes to demolish a garden broom!
But, to get back to the inhabitants of your kitchen cupboard, I’ve never had much luck with roach traps, but you could try feeding your cockroaches on a mixture of icing sugar and plaster of Paris. If they eat enough of that, they’re really stuffed!
You could, of course, console yourself with the fact that I have been told by many hotel managers, some of them five-star (the hotels, I mean, not the managers) that cockroaches are extremely fussy and choose the cleanest, smartest kitchens for their abode.
If you have a really big problem, your only option is to fumigate. It is the most effective answer, but it has its drawbacks. You will have to stay out of the house all day – preferably overnight as well – and take all unsealed packets of food with you. You will return to the job of sweeping dead gagas out of everywhere. You will also have to wash all your pots and pans, plates, cutlery and glasses, in case they have been contaminated. And you will probably feel sick for a couple of days as a result of the poisonous fumes.
You no doubt heard the story of the bent aerial on the short-wave radio? A guest asked how it got bent and I replied that I had knocked the radio off the shelf with my gas-mask. Nothing more was said, but it was obvious that she was trying to work out why I should be wearing a gas mask in my lounge. She said later that she had never known me do anything illogical and she had to work out the logical reason for my antics. After a week, she admitted defeat, and asked me.
The answer was really quite simple. I react so badly to the fumes that I cannot simply put a wet flannel over my face, rush into the house and open all the windows. I have to go to the health department and borrow a gas mask.
If you do decide that fumigation is the only answer, please do me a favour. Evacuate the lizards first!
Love Mom
