Ahh! Country life! Living in
this nearly one hundred year old house has been wonderful. Huge rooms, high
ceilings, stately old home with all the trimmings from 1912. The Walls 18
inches thick sandstone with a bit of sand and mortar, floors about a half inch
thick – (quasi-concrete) with cracks all over. The rising salt dampened walls
crumbling constantly into little piles on the floor, all you’d ever want! But
I’m forgetting: the ‘early settler colour scheme’ in the kitchen, you know, smoke
darkened walls and smoky ceilings, tiny widow above the stove. Yes, state of
the art 1960’s wood burning stove with all the mod cons, with very little
sunlight, dusty cobwebs, the lot! Cracked old lino with old newspaper as
underlay, very classy!
It all cleaned up very
nicely, BUT! The mice! Sometimes I wonder why God ever created them at all.
They are little miners and they come in wherever they want. They are agile
little critters, intent on one thing only: getting in annoying me! Don’t get me
wrong, I love all God’s creatures. Even had a beautiful pet mouse called
Rupert. He was gorgeous. Maybe it was because he was the only one and he stayed
in his palatial cage and just waited for us to feed him and play with him?
Anyhow, these grey ones are breeding like… well, mice! There’s a never ending
parade of tiny, grey, sneaky little critters always trying to get in and upset
my plans.
Picture Mission
Impossible music ‘Dum Dum da da Dum Dum’, go with me here. See a little mouse
climbing down the kitchen curtains, like Tom Cruisemouse slowly lowering
himself into the target area. The light is turned on, he freezes, “oops my
cover is blown, better go faster and attack!” Yep, that’s the picture, or maybe
ninja mice clad in black of night, sneaking in through the walls, infiltrating
the perimeter, into the cupboards. Yes this looks like a good place to attack
the enemy. Now I know why Mr Jinx always used to say “I hate those meeces to
pieces!” That’s exactly how I’m feeling right now!
Being a woman, a hoarder etc; I’ve tried to find a place for all my stuff, you know, things that might be
needed next week, next month, maybe even next year. They all have to be ready
when needed. These little grey squatters have gotten in and assumed ownership
of my stuff! I mean why get into my blanket cupboard after I’ve washed and
aired all my quilts, blankets and pillows? Thanks, but couldn’t you have gotten
in before I did all that washing and cleaning? Why wait until I’d finished?
Thanks a lot guys you are so considerate!
I’ve tried everything! Steel
wool crammed into every nook and cranny! Mouse traps, you know: even those
totally useless spring-loaded ones. Less painful on their little scrawny necks,
gotta take them out humanely! Then they started to attack the traps like kamikaze
mice, two at a time, trying to blow up the traps by sheer numbers; giving their
lives so that the other smaller ones could come and eat all that yummy peanut
butter! How do I fight them? I don’t know yet but I’ll get you!
I’m not even safe in my own
bed! I know they are there, sneaking about, just waiting to scare the crap out
of me as I try to get some sleep. It’s hard falling asleep, trying to get some
rest before the next attack, only to feel something crawling along the
bedclothes, almost making me jump out of my skin.
I scared the crap out of one
of them though! I was reading in bed late one night when I caught a glimpse of
one of their minions and I literally threw my book at him! That’ll teach you to
sneak up on me. I know your modus operandi and I’m waiting! I found the little
critter behind my bedside table the next day and actually felt a little sorry
for the tiny little thing. One down, one hundred to go! But I can’t feel sorry
for them, they are the ones driving me insane with their scratching and gnawing
at all hours of the night, keeping me from sleeping peacefully.
So I thought: go high-tech!
Spend a couple of hundred dollars on those new-fangled electro-sonic thingos
and let technology do the work for me! Sounds too good to be true! It stops
them from wanting to settle in for the winter because it drives them crazy.
Hey, that sounds good to me. Better them going around the bend than me! Sounds
like a plan. Okay let’s do it. Yay! It worked really well, or so I thought. I
scared two mice in the kitchen; they ran right into each other and almost
knocked themselves out.
Our two little dogs catch
the occasional mouse but not enough to lower the population. So my son and I
decided to let the outside cat in to get to work. Some chance! We took Sora
into the bathroom where we’d found a mouse and basically said “sic ‘im Rex!” We
closed the door and put him on the ground to catch the mouse. Did he? No way! He
was scared out of his wits because we’d brought him inside. All he could think
of was climbing up to the window and squawking to get out. Meanwhile the two of
us were being chased around the bathroom, screaming as the mouse got close to
our feet. If only I’d had the camera in there, we could have been on Australia
Another day I found a little
critter rolling a piece of dry dog food along the kitchen floor, trying to get
to cover before being caught. It looked like a little kid rolling a toy hoop along.
It made me feel sorry for it because it looked so human, but I mustn’t get soft,
he’s the enemy after all!
After all the stress, it’s
the sounds of chewing and scratching late at night that really annoys me the
most. It’s like they have amplifiers behind the cupboards to scare me out of my
wits. Maybe it’s the ‘Secret of Nimh’ all over again, so that’s what’s happened
to all that steel wool! They are fashioning new technology to use against me.
Help! They are taking over the world!
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