\u201cFred, did you know that some people think there’s a rat for every human being?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
:Yeah\u2026 But others think there\u2019re four people for every rat.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat many people, huh, Ralph?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rat population statistics are imperfect. Rats, like people, are social animals. They are shrewd, reproduce quickly, and have well- developed immune systems. They care for one another, enjoy talking to each other, but merely squeak when people are around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, alone in an alley by a dumpster Northeast of Philadelphia, Fred and Ralph, two sewer rats, continued to talk\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA rat for every four humans. Others say, it’s just for every three. You know what that means, Fred?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cNot enough rats?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cExactly.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For a while they were quiet in the dumpster shade, amidst the empty cans and plastic bags. Yes, the world is full of cans and bags. And flies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A bulbous-headed fly zipped by, followed by a number of others with their compound eyes and vigorous wings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere’s a lot of flies in the world, Ralph.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI know\u2026 They estimate about 130 quadrillion.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fred scratched \u2018130,000,000,000,000,000\u2019 on a bag with his paw.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIs that right, Ralph?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat’s it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He counted the number of zeros.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn other words, not enough flies either\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFred, did you know that some people think there’s a rat for every human being?\u201d \u201cWhat?\u201d :Yeah\u2026 But others think there\u2019re four people for every rat.\u201d \u201cThat many people, huh, Ralph?\u201d Rat population statistics are imperfect. Rats, like people, are social animals. They are shrewd, reproduce quickly, and have well- developed immune systems. They care … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa867U-101","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3845"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3845\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3846,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3845\/revisions\/3846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
David Sydney is a physician who writes fiction in and out of the EHR (Electronic Health Record).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"