Update from Wessyngton Road

Too busy to blog for the last couple of months - many posts written in my head (usually while walking the dog around the neighborhood, watching houses go up, silt in the rainwater in the gutter, or while getting updates about neighborhood Pest Control Issues) but none made it to keyboard - at least, not until now.

There is a new group that's been formed to support Morningside parks - the Morningside Parks Commission, Inc. There's a website and a Yahoo group, and the first project they have taken on is a toddler play area at Sidney Marcus Park. You may recall that the sandbox was closed last fall, eliminating a potential neighborhood source for toxoplasmosis exposure. The new group, headed by Natasha Moffitt and Scott Lenhart, is fundraising for a new toddler play area. Presumably the new play area will be Improved and Toxoplasmosis-Free. If you have a toddler, or used to have a toddler, or were ever a toddler yourself, please consider contributing; $75 gets you your very own engraved brick. According to the website, contributions are tax deductible.

Another neighborhood issue that needs attention is a familiar one, if you have read this blog before - that would be Rats. The news from the street is that The Rats are Back. Perhaps the recent rains have flooded them out of their winter quarters in someone's basement, or perhaps falling housing prices have made our street More Affordable - I'm not sure. Whatever the reason, they are back.

Angela had one in a cupboard in her house last week; it was captured and released in a Havahart trap. (Only Angela would do that. Most of us do not really have a heart when in comes to rats in our cupboards.) Then yesterday Tom saw it, or one of its friends or relatives, on our front porch in broad daylight. (Perhaps they prefer househunting by day.) So Tom put out the special, highly toxic Rat Treats in the special dispensers from Do It Yourself Pest Control. This worked amazingly well last time, and then the rats were invading our kitchen regularly. Hopefully this will keep them out of the house altogether.

But, like many other things, Rat Control is a Shared Responsibility. We all need to do our part. So our early summer block party is coming up at the end of the month; flyers should be going out soon, if they haven't already. Tom had wanted to have Trees Atlanta there or someone from the Georgia Urban Forestry Council to tell us why we should all plant trees. Trees are all well and good, but if the neighborhood is being overrun by Rats that seems to me to be a little more urgent. So maybe we should ask the guys from Do It Yourself Pest Control to come set up an exhibit.