Ello deh, you should be reading this in my Australian character’s voice.
Yeah, I’ve got characters, so? Sure, some people find that weird, others think I need to talk to a professional, but prostitutes are just too expensive lately. Look, it’s no secret that I’ve been a lonely, lonely….lonely, lonely man. We all know that, right? Right. But recently in my house, I’ve discovered that I have a friend. He’s tiny, and grey, and runs around on four legs eating my crumbs. Yes…I’ve got a mouse in the house.
Now many of you probably have dealt with this in the same way that I was going to when I first discovered the little feller (and actually Hoff first discovered him when he went to clean paint brushes or some shit like that, but he took him outside), right? You get some traps, peanut butter and…SNAP. Well, I’m lonely so I’ve given him a backstory, a name, and now I want to catch and release (again), so I’m on the hunt.
Crikey!
So step one in my little process, I need to come up with a plan. I’ve got tupperware, food I shouldn’t eat to use for bait, and time to brainstorm this, but nothing I come up with is good. Today I was going to get mouse traps and just kill the bastard, but it’s the one thing I forgot at the grocery store. Go figure, amirite? So tonight I’m sitting at the computer, reading some stuff on the US Open (yeah they’re still playing golf…it’s not The Masters, so I don’t really care) when in my peripheral vision what do you think I see? …the mouse. He’s so damn cute! I don’t want to kill him. I feel like I’m in Green Mile now!
Seriously, I’ve been here for about an hour now tossing croutons at him and getting tupperware containers out (because the engineer in me has decided I can make a mouse house out of some plastic and croutons…what a fucking idiot) trying to chase him down. We even had a staredown for a few minutes when I blocked his path back to the fridge. Yes, he lives behind my fridge. This is good and bad. It’s good because I know where to expect him, and it’s bad because it probably means there’s more than one of them…
I’m going to need a lot of traps.
Now, look…it is INCREDIBLY stupid to try to catch a wild mouse and keep it for a pet. They can have fleas and ticks, they can carry disease, not to mention interaction with humans stresses the shit out of them (literally), and all sorts of bad things can happen to them. Plus, they’re wild…they’ll bite you if they get stressed or scared. Don’t ever try to pick up a wild mouse!
So the first thing I tried to do is catch him by hand.
Yeah, I know what I just typed, who gives a shit? He bites me, my arm falls off, I go on disability and have to learn how to do everything with my left hand. I’ll survive, and the rest of you taxpayers will pay for me to sit around and go lefty all the time! You know, I should really change that up anyway, my right bicep and forearm are SO MUCH stronger than my left, it’s just—…well…you see, when a man becomes excited from thinking about a girl he knows or his neighbor’s wife, he—no, I’m going to stop. I think that’s a great idea for a future Plonker Sez; someone write that down. Where was I? Last I knew we were talking about me firing off some knuckle-children left handed..oh yeah, the mouse! Am I really writing about a mouse? God I’m lame…okay, back at it…
So yeah I tried to catch him with my hands. You know, for as small as they are (and their bodies are made out of basically what your ears are made out of – I saw that on Bill Nye or maybe read it on the internet once, so it has to be true) they’re fast as fuck! I bet you this little bastard could give Insane Bolt a run (no pun) for his money. Anyway, against lardass Plonker, he didn’t even break a sweat. In fact, as I sat down to write this he made a second appearance tonight and was taunting me this time. He grabbed a crouton and not only ran across the floor to his home, but he did it dragging the crouton. I mean this thing is half the size of his body! It would be like me running around the block hauling my garbage can, and I don’t even like taking that to the road (usually it’s because I’m afraid of bears), so I’m quite impressed.
I think it’s time for me to break down and just get the traps. I’m probably going to need half a dozen or so, because I am willing to bet there’s at least two adults and four or so young in a “nest” somewhere behind that fridge. This one is most likely an adult which means there’s probably one back there tending to the young, or the young and the other adult come out at other times. Taking food back leads me to think that the young are VERY young. Did you know they can breed practically all year? And a female can pop out up to about 11 little cheese munchers at a time! With a typical gestation period of around 21 days, it won’t take long before I’m just overrun by the little sons of bitches, so unfortunately, Steve (that’s what I named him) has to die. Then, all of his offspring have to die, as does his mate. Sorry, Steve…you fucked with an Alpha Male at the top of the food chain. Seriously, he’s seen my gut, he knows I’m at the top of the food chain.
I’m telling you all of this, not because I think it’s interesting (it’s not and you know it) or that you’re even reading it (Hoff, can you check the analytics? I bet we don’t get 15 hits to this, and I’ll probably read it three times right after I post it), but I tell you this so I can tell you a story. I promise this story will be the end of the post, so you’ll have to wait until next time to hear my heroic tale about how I caught Steve and his family/friends.
Picture in your mind, to help you understand…
It’s the year 2001, Christmas Eve. I’m in my apartment with my first wife (not Sai, this one is actually reasonably normal – I say that understanding that no woman is in any way “normal” but she’s closer to the “normal” side of the scale) and having worked retail, I’m finally done with “the season”. As I pour into the apartment we look around and happen to notice…doody. Yes, mouse poo. How does that Christmas story go?
When all over the kitchen, we saw mouse poo.
We ran out to WalMart, I knew just what to do!
Mouse traps and peanut butter, and cleaning supplies,
By morning I knew I’d have killed these guys…
So there we are on Christmas Eve, 10pm, 11pm, who knows? Might as well have been 4 in the morning. I can’t even remember how many mouse traps we set out, but I know it was a SHITLOAD. We scrubbed and scoured every surface in that kitchen, vacuumed and mopped, wiped and repeated. The next morning, we woke up and the traps under the sink, along the backsplash, on the floor…they all had dead mice in them. A mouse trap, if you’re going to kill them, is pretty humane from where I sit. It snaps their spine and kills them pretty quick. I’d say “instantly” but how quick is “instantly”? Did you know a human head can go on “living” for a bit after it’s separated from the body? A few months ago I got really into The Scarlet Pimpernel on Youtube and there’s quite a bit of Guillotine use in that flick (French revolution piece – not bad, but very 80s) so I looked that up. I’m getting side tracked again, aren’t I? Anyway, so I just hesitate to use the word “instantly” but it has to be pretty quick. It’s not like little Mickey sits there, his lungs being crushed by the spring loaded steel trap, gasping for every last breath. “Minnie…tell Goofy to host the Dundies…” It’s not like that at all. They come out, touch the PB, the rod dislodges releasing the spring, and before they know it…snap. If you don’t believe me, try it yourself. Touch the PB with your finger after you set the trap. Go ahead, I’ll wait.
…it hurt like a motherfucker, didn’t it? Dumbass.
