Of Mice and Women

Who was that cartoon cat that said “I hate meeces to pieces”?

I’d like to shake his, er, paw. Because I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Yes every year, ‘round about now, the local mice population decides to relocate en masse into our ceiling. And so every night at this time of year, I am serenaded by the sound of scratch scratch scratch within the walls.

Now I don’t begrudge them wanting to come in from the cold. I wouldn’t like to be raising my family out there in the backyard either. But unlike the mice, we work hard to earn money to put a roof over our head. We don’t just try to freeload off somebody else’s shelter.

And unlike the mice, I don’t feel the need to disturb all the occupants of the abode while making my bed.

The first inkling that our annual visitors were en route came about 2 weeks ago, and I haven’t managed a decent night’s sleep since.

There I was, deeply dreaming about … well, um, we don’t really need to go there do we… suffice to say I was deep in sleep when suddenly and inexplicably, the man of my dreams started to scratch himself. In a most undignified manner too, I might add. Even in full flight of fancy I found the behaviour a little odd and was none too impressed to be dragged out of fantasy into reality where the man was gone, but the scratching continued.

I stared blankly at the blackness trying to establish what the sound was and from whence it came. I then tried the element of surprise by flicking on the light with hopes of scaring anything away that was in the room. Sadly no, the tactic was not a success and that damn scratching continued. I realised it was going to be full-blown warfare as the enemy had obviously bunkered down above my head.

Cursing that the rotten rodents had the upper hand this time, I made a mental note to bring out the big guns the following night. (I also tried to make as much noise as possible in the daytime to disturb their sleep, but it doesn’t seem to have the same effect on them.)

Daylight saw me digging out the traditional set-and-forget mousetrap; the wooden base thing with deadly steel spring that would snap shut on any hapless creature trying to score a free meal. After many attempts to fix the thing without doing damage to my fingers in the meantime, the trap was set. All we had to do was wait for nightfall to come.

6 hours later I silently cheered as I heard the distinctive snap of the trap.

4 hours after that I was muttering about sneaky little so & so’s and their lucky escape.

Mice: 1, Jo: zero.

Next I bought some of those heave-and-leave poison packs, and we scattered them in the crawl space above.

Seems our resident mice have more selective taste than that, and not a single rat sack was even sniffed at, 2 days later.

Mice: 2, Jo: zip.

So it was back to the hardware store discussing my options with the helpful 12 year old who was on deck that day (well he seemed about 12 anyway), I purchased a couple of the newer mouse-friendly plastic traps. This, I don’t get, as isn’t the whole idea to mercilessly eradicate the little blighters?! Nonetheless, feeling sure that my actions would not be frowned upon if by chance anyone from PETA stopped by unannounced, it was home again to prepare the traps, this time using peanut butter as the bait- a supposed "guaranteed" way to catch any pests that dared pilfer the proffered foodstuff (try saying that quickly three times)!

After another scratching session through the wee small hours, I went to check the traps to see how they fared.

The sound of plastic being dragged across the floor should’ve prepared me.

There, looking like the most sorrowful little caricature one could imagine, was a teeny weeny little mouse entrapped by one teeny tiny toe it seemed, trying to make good its escape from the kitchen with trap in tow.

After trying to shield the pitiful little critter from the prying eyes of two small children and a dog, I called for my Beloved to take the pathetic little thing outside to release it. After calling me every kind of wuss under the sun, he did.

I’ll give you one guess who came back that night for a joyful family reunion that seemed to progress from one end of the house to the other, from dusk ‘til dawn.

Mice: 3, Jo: zilch.

It was at this point that I discovered a much better way to invest my money in this perpetual rodent rebellion, and I’m happy to say that last night at least, I didn’t hear a thing.

And so Mr Jinks, I totally concur with your summation of the situation whenever Pixie and Dixie were around: I too, hate meeces to pieces. But I’m lovin’ my new earplugs!

Jx
©2009