Impeccable timing

Stefan is spending this week as a guest speaker/researcher at the university in Zurich. As is likewise the case in the U.S., it is only after he departs for such trips that the hitherto unseen resident vermin decide to rear their ugly heads.

So far, we've had very few problems with bugs in Freiburg, having left the mammoth mosquitoes behind in Bavaria. We have come across the occasional small, light brown insect wandering by itself late at night in the kitchen; I believe some people might call such creatures "cockroaches," although the local variety look pretty tame compared to the giant palmetto bugs back home in North Carolina (where we call them "palmetto bugs" rather than "roaches" because it makes their utter disgustingness sound more genteel).

But the beast that has me jumpy at the moment is not a bug, and so far lurks primarily in my imagination. Someone has set a large trap in the basement garage: a long cage, artfully camouflaged with tufts of turf and peat moss, containing a whole egg to tempt the crafty pest. Stefan said, "oh, they're probably trying to catch a...hmm, I don't remember what it's called in English. They're about so big, bigger than a rat, and they eat the plastic and rubber hosing under cars."

Every time I go into the parking garage now--alone, as my husband is off living the academic high life in Switzerland--I expect to see a large, hairy, tick-infested, long-tailed, irate animal trapped in the cage, shaking the metal bars with its angry little fists, and barking at me using vocabulary I don't understand and never will because I made the fatal error of choosing to study Latin, French, and Cat in high school instead of Rodent.

The optimist in me is holding out hope that the animal will be cute and fluffy--a hamster, perhaps, or a marmot--and that it will gaze at me sweetly with its long-lashed eyes as it daintily, happily, hygienically licks the remaining bits of egg off its tiny paws. The pessimist scoffs and reminds me there are new and improved treatments for rabies these days.