How to Entertain a Toddler

Squatters

We had squatters in our house. That seems like such a bizarre thing to say in the 21st century, but it's true--someone was living in our flooded-out house while we've been in the process of renovating it. When I told my sister about it, her response was "What's a squatter?" Oh, to live in a place that didn't recently suffer a major disaster.

Kenny discovered this fact about three weeks ago when he went over to see the progress the contractors have made--we currently have no walls, as they recently ripped out all of the moldy sheet rock. When Kenny walked into the house that Saturday afternoon, he found two sleeping bags on the concrete slab in our living room, another couple of sleeping bags in the back den, and various groceries in what remains of the kitchen. After my initial shock at the thought of someone living in our house, albeit a house that's nothing more than a shell, I thought, "what the hell--let them live there until we're ready to start putting in new flooring and walls." The water has remained turned on for the past year and a half, just because it seemed easier to leave it on and pay the minimal monthly fee, so our uninvited guests had been reasonably good about cleaning up after themselves. And as long as they didn't hurt the house, what harm was there? Stupid, I suppose, but I think both Kenny and I were kinda hoping they might just burn the place down or something, as we've been a bit ambivalent about rebuilding.