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Mpls, MN, United States

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Sunday, December 02, 2007

More mice

We're under about five inches of snow and my landlord is, as of yesterday, paying for my heat, so I've been home all day trying futilely to write a paper due Tuesday. About two hours ago, there was much screaming and commotion from my neighbor's side of the wall; about an hour ago, she heard a scream from mine; and a few minutes ago, she knocked on my door and we compared stories.

Mine was pretty tame; the only reason I screamed was that this morning's routine mousetrap check had been negative (did I mention that I chalked up number ELEVEN on Friday, after a Thursday evening mousetrap run prompted by seeing one one my counter, TWICE?*), but when I did another habitual check later after throwing something in the trash, I was completely startled to see a tail. Thankfully it was attached to an intact mouse who'd been cleanly killed by the trap now obscuring it from view--but it was still a bit of a shock.

My neighbor's story was much better. She'd been about to head out for coffee, pulling her boots on on the landing, when her foot encountered something soft in the toe of one. Thinking she'd left a balled-up sock in it, she inverted the boot and shook it out--only to have the "sock" tear off across the floor of her apartment. She ran shrieking up and down the length of her apartment--the sound I'd heard from next door--while the friend she had over attempted to catch it. I was doubly horrified by her story, recalling that to take the trash out after discovering my own mouse, I'd slipped my bare feet into the snowboarding boots that had been in my closet since last winter, without even shaking them out. Eeps.

She asked if I had any mousetraps, but I had used my last that morning. She's going to pick some up for me when she goes. Sigh.

*The boy at Ace who rang up my purchase asked me if I'd used that particular kind of mousetrap before. Amused, I answered, "Yes; I've killed eight mice with them," and then, curious, asked, "Why?" He mentioned that some customers had reported trouble with the sensitivity of the yellow cheese pad of that "easy-set" variety. I said I'd had the mice steal bait a few times, but that overall they'd been quite satisfactorily successful. As he handed me my receipt, he said, "Have a good evening... killing mice."

6 comments:

m said...

ok, the mouse in the boot thing is just too much. i don't think i would ever recover from that.

strovska said...

well, i was thinking this would be completely unrelated, but it turns out it's not (and i'm sorry it's not, because the mental image of mice in boots is blood-curdling). but...i was on the ll.bean website a while ago looking for something my mom requested for christmas, and thought i'd look at the boots (since my own boot dilemna continues). i happened to see these and they looked vaguely like your description of what you were looking for, if indeed you're still looking):

http://www.llbean.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CategoryDisplay?page=merrell-spire-peak-waterproof-boots&categoryId=47914&storeId=1&catalogId=1&langId=-1&parentCategory=503436&cat4=503425&shop_method=pp&feat=503436-tn

sorry the link is so bizarrely long, i didn't really have time to figure out how to put a link in the comments. let me know if it doesn't work and i'll try again.

strovska said...

okay, it didn't work. check my blog--i'll use it as a "cheating" post.

Leah said...

I think a mouse would be better than a scorpion.

I'm not sure why I felt it necessary to make that comment. I guess at least mice can't sting you.

Kendra said...

oh gosh, mice! eek! i still think i'm more scared of spiders though.

Unknown said...

Mmmmm, boots. I demand to know more about these boots you were looking at. I love boots.