What I found under the sink

[Louise Lotz]

Under the sink was not too bad, at least from the organisational point of view. I must have tidied it at some point or maybe someone else did.

It was really quite tidy.

All the shoe shining stuff has disappeared, from under the sink though, and I think this may have gone into the cupboard next door to the sink. This next door cupboard is a totally different matter - it is terribly untidy, crammed to the gills with miscellaneous stuff and spare lightbulbs that I can't find when I need them. Next time I get the instruction to tidy the under sink cupboard I will start on that one - the next to the under-the-sink cupboard. It is the last bastion of kitchen clutter.

Well the good surprise was that under the sink things were fairly tidy and not too messy. And thereby hangs a tale.

Some time way back we had a rodent infestation. Now having rodents in the kitchen is about the worst thing I can think of, so I got rid of them very quickly with a mixture of poison and electronic scaring screecher machines. I am sorry to be so cruel - but let's face it, it's us or them. So I had to get over my thoughts about humane traps or returning them unharmed to the wilds. There has been a mega-explosion of the rodent population in our district and we need a pied piper to come and magic them away to their doom.

Last year I think it was spiders...

However, during this horrible time, I would to hear them in the back of the kitchen cupboard and I wondered what they could be up to in there. I did put down poison which they took for several nights running. After that I could hear them in the back of the cupboard under the sink, despite the fact that the poison I was leaving out in the open area was not disappearing any longer. I thought they had got wise to it. Years back when we had the mouse infestation I had to completely reorganise that cupboard as the mice had eaten all the cleaning cloths and left a sprinkling of droppings on everything.

So I was not looking forward to the job of cleaning this cupboard again.

However, I found it fairly clean and tidy. When I got to the back of the cupboard though, I found 2 large plastic bottles of heavy duty rodent poison. The largest and toughest of these bottles had a big hole in the bottom, and was nearly empty. The rodents had obviously chewed their way through this and succeeded in poisoning themselves completely without my help.

Now although they have completely disappeared from here and also in the loft, I need to go round everywhere and find any tiny holes in the walls or in the eaves and fill them tightly with wire wool so that some air can get in and out if necessary but no creatures can get in. I need to work out exactly where they come in and out. I do already have some ideas.

I also found some moth balls, which I know they hate and I want to put these along their trails in the loft. I won't put them in the kitchen because it makes it too nasty but I need to put some chemicals down the back of the cupboard just to make it toxic and unpleasant there. No small kids or hamsters etc around here any more so it might be OK. I need to work out what though. I need to do some thinking and research...

Anyway, I will take a photo of this chewed up bottle at some point.

It is now all wonderfully clean and I have washed all the cloths that came out of there and given the place a good scrubbing and disinfecting.

Bonus number two is that I found some great cleaning materials, including a nice new pair of rubber gloves - also a few rolls of bin liners. I am going to analyse these materials and do the cleaning I need to do to get them used up, because I don't want to waste them and the chances are it really needs doing.

First of all, I found some bathroom cleaner - so I have taken this up to the bathroom.

The rest of the rodent poison is going up to the loft which I am busy emptying. There was also some animal repellant and mothballs, and all of this will be used to make it a less than cosy space for any beasties. I am having the whole loft re-insulated as soon as I can get it cleared... So I need to think about the timing of the mothball solution - that might need to come after loft has been re-insulated. But I need to remove the flooring up there and plug up the holes.

Which is going to be quite a big job.

So I can use the bathroom descaler in my mission to clean the grout.

Then there is some wood cleaning stuff and some oven cleaner and some kitchen cleaner.

So I need to clean my wooden kitchen doors, then polish the wood and then finally to clean the oven.

This all fits in fairly well with my plans.

I also need to go to the hardware store to buy some screws that I need for something else and then I can get wire wool and gypsum to plug any holes that might let rodents in. I also need a strong steel mesh cover for the water tank up in the loft - so need to take some measurements there.