Well, if I was gonna do some smoking before next Monday, which I will and would, I would take wire dikes and cut out the bad area... that is if possible, wire tie the cord back... short extension cord and hope like hell...if all else failed I would get a packaged of cook PB out of the freezer and have left-overs,oh well!
Good luck!
Side note, I spent over 1200.00, my part, on fixing car problems 3 times because of them over grown rats.The wife didn't even gripe about me getting rid of the problems, my sympathy to you.