Last night when I came home my toilet was stopped up, a leftover treat from seven that morning when I first noticed that both the bathtub and toilet had ceased holding up their end of the bargain. That bargain being the actual drainage of whatever spikely leg hair, foamy shampoo or, you know, Other that I flush down the drain. By the time I came home the tub had emptied, leaving a nice ring of grayish soap scum snailed down the side but the commode had just continued in its floating toilet paper dance all damn day, never draining, waiting for me to come home and lavish attention and praise all over it's gurgling ass.

Think you're going to get to piss? THINK AGAIN, MISSY.

Because I am in general deathly afraid of toilets I cleaned up the bathtub first, scraping the morning residuals from the plastic sides. When I could hold off no longer I turned my attention to the porcelain goddess, a goddess with whom I was about to have a very stern conversation. But conversation doesn't work much with porcelain gods, porcelain not being the responsive type, so I grabbed a plastic hangar from my closet and tapped the side of the bowl in the vain hope that I might dislodge whatever obstruction was, well, obstructing the drainage of the (thankfully) clear water. I should add here that while the water was clear, there were bits of toilet paper floating in it. I'm a bit of a water waster, bite me. I don't like leaving mounds of snot rags hanging out in my trashcan so I flush them.

Unfortunately that did not work out for me yesterday. It was the Conservation Gods taking my dare, upping me 2 chips and biting a chunk out of my ample left buttock.

So obviously the bowl-tapping did not work out. And because I refuse, REFUSE to lift up the toilet tank lid -- oh god just the thought of taking off the lid makes my skin crawl -- I called my friend Lilleeee instead.

Phone ringing.

Lilleeee: Hi princess

Me: Hi sugarplum

Lilleeee: Whatcha doin

Me: Oh, nothing. Um.

Lilleeee: What's wrong?

Me: Um, okay. Um. Please for the love of everything that's holy say you have a plunger because I'm having some toilet issues *silent retching* and I need some assistance.

Lilleeee: Well, I'm at J's house but just go let yourself in and see if my brother is there- he might know if we have one

Me: Oh, bless you child

Lilleeee: kisses

Me: smacks *click

So I go next door and yell up at Lilleee's brother, who informs me that no, there is no plunger *shudder* on hand but perhaps I should try the toilet brush.

Ok, I should further clarify that my petrifying fear of toilets includes all toilet accoutrements including but not limited to: brushes, plungers, disposable cleaner pads, tablets that turn the water blue and Anything Under The Tank Lid. So the thought of shoving the toilet brush into that gently swirling, oh-so-menacing water was right up there with thinking about peeling off my own skin with chicken wire.

But I am an adult, and adults do things like unclog toilets.

Back inside my apartment I had to shoo Fat Kitty away from the bowl because he was drinking from it *audible retching* and unfortunately I will never again be able to touch him because he has tainted himself with the water of the toilet. Blech. After Fat Kitty sulked away, audibly expressing his displeasure at being displaced from that Bowl-o-Death, I bravely and firmly grasped the brush handle and plunged it into the roiling depths.

Where I hit something hard.

Strange.

I pulled back the brush and pushed aside the clumps of toilet paper, hoping to see what might possibly be the hardness that I'd found at the bottom of the bowl hole. But the toilet paper had spent all day soaking and instead of moving aside in clumps it just sort of disintegrated with all my toilet brush poking, turning the water a cloudy white.

Still unable to see what was blocking the water from draining I decided I would remove what toilet paper chunks I could by utilizing my soup ladle and placing the paper bits in a plastic bag. Which I did. And then promptly threw the ladle away.

Looking back into the toilet depths I was actually able to see the bowl hole, where I could just barely make out that there was, in fact, something blocking the entrance. I put the brush back in and swirled it around the opening to get a better look.

Wait.

Was that?

Is that?

OHMIGOD IS THAT AN EYE? A SMALL, BEADY BLACK EYE??

I will not lie to you. I screamed like a little girl, dropped the brush in the bowl and ran into the living room where I jumped on the couch in an attempt to get away from that beady-eyed monster in my toilet. A monster that was obviously going to swim up, fly through the air and eat me alive. Duh.

After a couple of seconds I calmed down and realized that whatever it was, it was most certainly dead. And dead animals don't freak me out near as much toilets. Though dead animals inside toilets is never a good combination.

So back into the bathroom I went, this time armed with my lone metal hangar (the rest are all white plastic because, hello, no wire hangars!) which was bent into a hook shape. I shoved the hangar in the water and caught the edge of the furry creature under its belly and pulled it to the surface. It was then that I got a good look at it.

It was not an animal. It was a toy. A mother fucking furry cat toy shaped like a light brown mouse, covered in actual fur with beady little black eyes and a leather tail.

I went through all of that because my ignorant cats dropped a mother fucking cat toy in my mother fucking toilet.

Fabulous.