As with so many incidents of unrest, it starts small and quickly escalates; so you may want to sit-down for this one.

One day the courtyard is peaceful and quiet. Then in creep the interlopers. A goat. Others follow. All too soon there are three goats. Then come sheep and a lamb. Finally, burros and cattle. Mooing and braying animals who don't know how to tell time. Two in the morning? Time to bray. That braying sound . . . the same sound that I once paid money to hear from the South African JackAss penguin . . . well it isn't quite so charming here in my own courtyard.

Hot season . . . and my first night sleeping outdoors; but not merely to avoid the oven that has become my hut. Nay, my flight to the outdoor hammock was prompted by riotous unrest . . . a true invasion. With le chauleur here and temps rising, I keep my door open almost at all times. The entrance of Rex and Dora was inevitable, and, as it happens, not altogether undesirable. The courtyard canines nap for hours on my concrete floors, acting as dust mops. Wherever Rex and Dora nap, upon their return to the courtyard there are nicely dusted spots on the floor. Jill the Pill could do no better.

But alas, with the open-door invitation, also entered a mouse. And a lizard. Now I'm not particularly unraveled by a mouse, nor by a lizard; however, the idea of a mouse running across my bed in the night isn't appealing in the slightest. And a lizard? Hey, remember the ol' Dragon Hotel . . . first night in-country . . . size of a kitten . . . PTSD! Enough said.

So now what? Well, I'm a PCV and thus resourcefulness is second nature. Or not.  But it's the age of the world wide web, and thus, I cheated. Before ever leaving Dallas I had read the blog of another volunteer (Morocco, I believe) who truly invented a better mouse trap. I followed her brilliant example. In truth, I'd been waiting for the opportunity to try-out her wickedly evil scheme.  A scheme so simple and yet so brilliant. Here's how it goes, step by step.

1. Empty PC water filter bucket.
2. Duct-tape a pencil onto the very tip-end of a ruler.
3. Insert pencil into the empty cardboard roll from toilet paper. Yes, toilet paper is so precious here that I even keep the cardboard tubes.
4. Place raspberry jam onto the distal end of the toilet paper core. You're catching-on now, right? That cardboard tube is going to roll right over the moment anything steps onto it.
5. Create a mouse ramp from the kitchen shelf using ruler/pencil/T.P.core.
6. Exit hut to comfortable hammock. Wait for mouse to step onto the cardboard roll in its attempt to eat my overpriced raspberry jam.
7. Run into hut when the cardboard tube rolls-over under the weight of the mouse.
8. Laugh at mouse now trapped in the empty water filter.

Worked like a charm. The next morning children were beckoned and instructed to remove the mouse and end its mouse life. Face facts, kids . . . there's never just one mouse. It had to go.

The lizard-removal, however, created a greater challenge. Mats were removed from the floor and placed vertically to block any entrance to the bedroom and closet (OK, you know it's not really a closet). Children were called to assist. They brought their straw brooms and sticks. Instinctively they knew to be gentle with the lizard. I was very impressed. Impressed as I waited outside . . . way outside . . . ready with an empty tin of butter cookies in order to capture & contain the lizard. Remember the first rule of the PC: Do no harm. OK, that may not be the first rule, but there was no need to harm a lizard.

Lizard contained and urged to find other accommodations, calm returned to Po's best courtyard. If Rex or Dora had even an ounce of terrier in their eclectic heritage, this would have never occurred. So I think that the PC's Do No Harm rule requires some clarification. Surely it does not apply not to mice. So how can I leave-open my door and still keep-out these unwanted rodents and reptiles? We can only speculate.