Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Mouse Trap (skip this one, Mom)

So, we live in an old house with lots of spaces for mice to sneak in. Both of our downstairs neighbors also have cats. That gives us odds of about 100% of having mice in our place (sorry, Mom, I told you not to read this!) Our big oaf dogs are only good for alerting us when we have a mouse in the house, not actually preventing the mice from entering nor catching the mouse once entered. We have tried humane traps, electronic deterents, inhumane traps... but these mice know better. I know this and generally accept is as a necessary byproduct of the old house. As long as they don't surprise me or appear in my bed or something I am kind of ok with the mice scurrying under the cabinets and such.

Well, I think we had a sickly or disabled or otherwise confused mouse this past weekend. Normally they are very fast and keep hidden, but Feeble Mouse went straight into the middle of the bathroom floor, crawled over my dirty clothes, over the bath mat and got caught in the shower curtain. Maybe it didn't notice the 2 cabinets calling for it to escape under. Anyway, this qualified as surprising me (I was standing on said bath mat) and I screamed and jumped onto the tub edge when I saw something furry coming my way (a reasonable response, I think). Feeble Mouse just sat there looking surprised, too. Where was mouse-stalker Ikaika when I needed him? After years of him stalking mice around the house and hours spent with his whole front half under the kitchen cabinets trying to capture the mouse... he was worthless in the moment of truth.

Fast forward to the next day: Feeble Mouse continues his dangerous escapades into the middle of the floor, but this time Ikaika finally catches him! Kai pounces, but didn't hurt the mouse and then with the mouse between his paws and under his mouth, Ikaika just sniffed him (further convincing me that Ikaika is an even bigger wuss than originally thought). The mouse escaped, but was slow (and stupid enough) to get caught by bucket-yielding Ray. Ray released him into the backyard, but I have little hope that the poor thing will make it long. Ah well, our house is again mouse free for the moment.

2 comments:

graneda said...

this was like a car wreck for me...............couldn't stop reading and now I'm scare to enter your home! Maybe I'll bring my kitty along....He kills(maybe only slows them down enough for me to use the garbage can trick) snakes in the basement for me so I'm going to go on thinking he is successful in protecting me! :)

kj said...

sorry, mom, but i think you bringing your cat to chase the mouse, with my dogs chasing the cat would end up like a tom & jerry cartoon gone wrong! look at it this way - at least you will always know if there is a mouse and where it is because ikaika will be obsessing!