There’s always lots of fun in the boating world, some of it’s silly fun, and some of it just hysterical; Yesterday was hysterical.
Bob and I were getting ready for the equipment to arrive to remove the boom, when I spotted a rat onboard, rats run rampant here in the boatyard but we were still in the water and (stupidly) we were feeling immune to “rat attack”. I’m not at all frightened by rats, I actually think they’re quite cute, and often so much nicer than many people!!!!!! Having said that, I don’t particularly want a rat living aboard chewing through lines and wires and leaving droppings everywhere, so I quickly decided that I needed to get rid of it (in a non fatal way, obviously). I tried to chase the rat from the boat instead succeeded in chasing him/her onto the swim platform, where the poor little thing just sat and cowered with no where to go other than the water. I felt so sorry for the poor little rat and didn’t know what to do. Then Debbie and Stephen arrived, having told them what was going on, “you can’t have a rat on board” they said, so I replied that I knew that, but I couldn’t just chase it into the water to drown! “Rats can swim”, said Bob and Stephen in unison, “I’ll do it” said Stephen, “get me a broom”. I fetched the broom then said “If I hand you the broom its the same as drowning it myself”. Always ready with a quick response, Stephen replied with “put the broom on the deck, I’ll pick it up, that way you haven’t given it to me”. Stephen picked up the broom and said “don’t watch”, after a few seconds of watching Debbie laughing at Stephen on the stern, I heard commotion behind me and turned to see the rat leaping from the broom Stephen had been holding but had dropped like a hot potato as the rat ran up the broom stick towards him (lets face it no one wants a rat bite) then suddenly it was running at break neck speed along the deck towards me; natural reaction caused me to scream like a banshee (so ashamed that I did that) as the rat ran past my feet, leaped from the deck past Debbie on the dock and hot-footed it disappearing under the boardwalk… We were all in stitches, with everyone wishing they had, had a camera to record the event. As it is, its just another silly post for my website. Boat life is never EVER dull…….