Tell Us About a Lovely Moment With Your Dad

Sunday is Father’s Day. Normally, I’d use the Hallmark holiday as an excuse to talk about moms, but I think it might be nice to share a few lovely memories about the fathers (or father figures) in our lives. Was there ever a time when your dad gave you a piece of advice that changed your life? Did he introduce you to a lifelong love of motorcycles, or teak furniture, or whiskey, or travel, or food, and you bond over those subjects? Did he once tell a dad joke so expertly corny you’ve committed it to memory and frequently repeat it, now devoid of irony? If Father’s Day is a painful experience, feel free to sit this one out—or to share something about the true star of Father’s Day, your mom. I just want to hear some sweet stories.

Now let’s take a look at last week’s winners. These are your worst encounters with rodents. Sorry in advance. There were just too many horror stories to select from!

happysunday, this is a nightmare:

I was traveling through rural Turkey in 1992. Stopped for lunch at a little roadside restaurant and needed to use the toilet. Sat down, did my business, then stood up and flushed only to see some frantic movement in the bowl as a gigantic rat struggled to stay afloat through the whirlpool. I can still feel the phantom bite that I escaped so nearly.

tendollarbanana, once again for the people in the back, THIS IS A NIGHTMARE:

I moved into a ground floor apartment with my sister in Lower Manhattan in 2016. The place was fine for two young women in their mid 20s— it had clearly been chopped up into a 2 bedroom when it used to be just one. I worked nights in restaurants, so my sister was the first person up in the morning to use the bathroom and kitchen while she got ready for work.

One morning I woke to a bloodcurdling scream coming out of the bathroom. My sister had been sitting on the toilet pooping when she felt sometime tickle her bottom. A sizable rat had crawled up the drain pipe and into our toilet bowl while she was defecating. She popped up, slammed the toilet lid shut, and flushed it down the toilet.

When we called our super and asked him to come down, he slapped his knee and said, “That’s the third time this weekend!” Developers were demolishing a building next door and all the rats from the ruins had scampered into the sewers. He “took care of the problem” by pouring bleach down the drainpipe, then promptly stopped answering our calls.

Apparently, this is a much more common occurrence than you’d think— Google “Nat Geo Rat Toilet” if you care to.

My sister never went to the bathroom in that apartment again, and made us move within 6 months of moving in. I couldn’t afford the apartment without her, even with a sub-letter. The saga continues far beyond this point, and includes a cockroach-infested sequel apartment, a very felonious gangster landlord, and months of therapy for my sister.

Curious Squid, at least it wasn’t a rat?:

Years ago, fast asleep in bed with my then partner, one of our cats jumped up onto the bed trilling excitedly and stomping about. Only half awake I reached out in the dark and felt she had something in her mouth, figured it was some random household oddment as she was wont to play with and act like she’d hunted and slain. My fingers closed around the something in her mouth and she chomped and I pulled simultaneously, and suddenly the smell of warm iron filled my nostrils and half a mouse came off in my hand. I wasn’t half asleep anymore after that.

ArmChairCopyEditor, I’m never going to use a tissue again:

About ten years ago, my partner and I traveled to the Hudson Valley Garlic Festival — it’s a truly amazing event and if you live in New York, you should go. When we left Brooklyn, we both felt great. Midway through the trip, we contracted a cold that produced intense amounts of mucous. We stayed two nights at a crappy chain motel, and when we left, I grabbed the box of tissue from the built-in aluminum tissue dispenser in the wall of the bathroom. We used the tissues ALL the way back to the city. Then I dropped all of my stuff in our office nook and moved on with my life. A day or two later, I noticed that our cats had congregated around the tissue box. And…a few hours later, I smelled The Smell.

I investigated, and yes, there was a dead mouse in the tissue box. I have encountered many a dead (and alive) rodent in my life, nbd, but I DRAW THE LINE at rubbing rotting mouse particles all over my face ew ew ew no. I still shiver.

SnakeCL, as other commenters have already pointed out, this is some Stephen King mess:

When I was a wee lil’ one, I lived in a small coastal town in Maine that was pretty out in the boonies. It had a deep water port though, so ships used to dock there and transfer paper pulp from the local logging for long journeys, so there was a lot of international ships.

So one day, I’m out in the yard playing, and my dad is doing some roofing, when we notice this… thing… loafing its way up the road from the port. It had to be at least 2 feet long, with the typical rat tail trailing off it even more. It basically wheezes its way up the road, people coming outside and gawking at this thing, then begging it doesn’t try to come into their yard.

Guess which yard it tried to amble its way into?

So my dad, realizing whats happening, and somewhat worried this Wharf Rat on Steroids is going to try and make its home under the lattice-work of our porch, grabs a shovel and engages it in single combat, with the rest of the neighborhood watching, but not doing anything to help.

The rat-monster-thing basically lunges at my dad’s legs, and he smacks it with the shovel, and it was probably one of the loudest shovel clangs I’ve ever heard in my life. Rat-monster recoils, then lunges, and gets smacked, again, and again, and again. After a few of these, and some tense moments with my dad avoiding this thing sinking those nasty yellowed front teeth into his shin or ankle, it literally just turned its rat-ass right back around and starts marching back towards the dock again.

For all I know it just walked right back onto the ship it came off of and had had enough of anything in my little town.

I still have no clue if it was really some sort of Ratzilla, some other form or rodent, or whatever. But I still remember it looked diseased as hell, with big chunks of missing fur and stuff. Whatever it was, it was not coming to pets.