Expedition to The Top of The House

Saturday was the day I went up to the attic to determine what's been going on.

I began by banging on the trap door in the ceiling, to ensure that no living, napping thing would come falling out when I opened it. I really wasn't in the mood to have a squirrel latch onto my throat or anything. It was that kind of a day.

Having made sure that the door area was clear, I opened it up and pulled down the ladder. Nothing ambushed me as I ascended, which was a good sign.

My eyes went immediately in the direction of where the noises had been heard earlier. The insulation there seemed a little ruffled, but that seemed to be consistent all along that side of the attic, and it was all otherwise perfectly intact. I did note that the insulation did not go all of the way to the edge (not much head room for that), so something could easily have been running around in that far area and make plenty of uninsulated noise.

Armed with my trusty flashlight, I proceeded to inspect every inch of the wire mesh along the opening between the roof and the wall. For starters, it appeared as if there wasn't much of an opening after all, and the mesh along this very narrow opening was still in perfect order. Nothing as big as a squirrel could have gotten in that way. A similar check along the back side of the attic yielded the same results.

So it doesn't look like anything has been up there. Just for grins, I did look around for electrical wiring that could be chewed upon, should some creature so inclined did get up there. Aside from a wire going along the rafters, providing power to the two attic lights, I could find nothing of that nature. Unless there was something underneath the insulation, it would seem that all of the power lines go to the outside of the back wall and then are routed down to the basement. Even if a squirrel could get into the attic, there's only so much damage he could do.

So we went about our business of putting our broken down moving boxes up there, and then we called it a day, attic-wise, confident that all we were hearing on Thursday was a couple of squirrels doing their thing safely outside on the roof.

Around 11:30 that very night, we heard more noises that may or may not have been coming from right above us. Only this time, it sounded like mice or perhaps their larger cousins, rats. If that keeps up, I'll investigate again. It's possible that there's some kind of opening next to the chimney, but it wouldn't be situated in a way that it could possibly lead outside. Maybe the next door neighbor has a rodent problem. I will remain diligent of the situation, and share with you, my readership, any updates that can be spun into something reasonably exciting.