Three Blind Mice...See How They Run

I've been feeling rather SKETCHY lately. A bit FRAZZLED. And even a tad FREAKED-OUT. I'm utterly and completely SPOOKED.

You see, our mouse problem has turned into a MOUSES PROBLEM (as Alison would call it). Every little creak of our house makes me cringe. Every movement of shadow, every flicker of light makes me jump out of my skin. I'm that scared of mice.

In fact when Hank came to bed Tuesday night, he accidentally hit the bed post, shaking me from a deep sleep. Apparently I screamed from beneath the covers and then cryptically asked, "What's the score?" Hank shrugged this off as mouse-induced insanity, I suppose. I don't remember a thing.

I do remember asking him to check things out at 4 in the morning when I heard "something out there" in the house. He came back to bed with three glorious words.

"We got 'em!"

At that point I think I heard angels in heaven singing. Relief overwhelmed me, and I actually fell asleep quite peacefully. Alison was quite excited to see our furry little pal "Mickey" entrapped in its tomb, and she didn't spare any details about size, color, trap position etc. I wanted to vomit, but was utterly relieved to know that our pal had passed.

Wednesday was spent in sheer relief and comfort of normalcy. Hank had cleaned up the kitchen (the death scene), and even threw away all of the traps. Wednesday night I bravely entered the kitchen for the first time in days, and as I was putting away some pans in the cupboard, a GRODY rodent came FLASHING out and ran towards my feet.

I screamed a blood-curdling scream. In fact, dogs responded by barking and howling at me (really). Hank checked out the kitchen while I quickly ran to Lowe's to buy THE SAME TRAPS. AGAIN! Oh the horror! I knew another sleepless night was ahead, and I wanted to run and hide.

It's moments like these when it seems that God is watching from above, playing silly jokes on me. Chuck E. Cheese commercials kept airing. The House of Mouse eerily taped itself on TiVo. And then Alison chose Noisy Nora, a story about a loud little mouse who doesn't get attention from her family.

Thursday morning Alison and Hank checked the traps again to find mouse #2 (we'll refer to this one as "Chuck E.") with its head BLUDGEONED by a snapping trap. I think at this point I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Actually Alison was quite the heroine. She opened doors for me, peeked in cupboards, turned on lights, and checked out rooms for me. She has NO FEAR at all. On Thursday morning we came home from art class, and Alison dutifully checked the traps for me. She proudly announced, "Mama! I chased a mouse right into a trap!" And lo and behold, she had chased a mouse right into a sticky trap!!!

And then she gave me too many details.

"Awww, Mama....he's all bloody! There's blood coming out of him face, Mama!"

I was a bit curious to know why he was bloody, but I couldn't bring myself to look at the trap.

"He's still alive, Mama! Look at it, Mama! Look!"

I thought I was going to pass out so I turned my head and to my HORROR! I saw that a snapping trap across the kitchen had been triggered. Eerily there was NO mouse, but PLENTY of BLOOD. Apparently "Minnie" had pulled out of the guillotine-style trap, and then dragged herself across the room. And that's when Alison entered the kitchen and scared her into STICKY DEATH.

Fortunately my mother was present, and helped calm my nerves. She too was a heroine and cleaned out our entire pantry and reorganized our cupboards so that tiny critters cannot lurk and hide anymore. I'm still a bit freaked out. I haven't seen any furry little friends in over twenty four hours, but I am not going to let down my guard!!!

P.S. If you haven't checked out the comments from my previous mouse post, please do. Some of them are HILARIOUS! I think that Nurse Cox and Violetismycolor win for CREEPIEST stories! What do you think?

P.S. #2 My linklicious page has been updated! You may have to refresh your browser to view the new changes.

Comments

[violetismycolor]

Wow, you beat my bat story completely, but to make you feel better...one of my neighbors has a pet door for her cat. She says that the cat will bring all sorts of things into the house (dying things that it catches). Well, the cat has started bringing them in, in the middle of the night, and jump onto their BED with said things. Sometimes, they are still alive. She says that she will feel this 'bouncing' all over the bed and she will yell at her hubbie to turn on the light and catch whatever it is (usually a mouse!). But last week, when the light was turned on, the thing was a full size Squirrel! Talk about freaking out... Well, you can imagine.

[justjenn]

Ah ha - how did you know Seonna Hong is one of my faves too? I went to her last show at the sixspace gallery downtown.

[alexis]

I just checked out your Paper Princess site and fell in love with the gift boxes picture frames. You do such beautiful work!

[laura]

Argh! I totally can related. We inherited some critters when we moved into this house, and found the last one just a few weeks ago ... *hugs*

[Giao]

Eeeeee. Grody dead rodents are pretty yuck. Yay for brave daughters and moms to help out. Violetismycolor--your neighbor's stories have got to be insane. I'd nail that catdoor shut!

[ani]

EWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Your daughter is brave. Time to call in the mouse police?