not a creature was stirring

I have four mousetraps sitting in a defensive perimeter around my oven.  They look like a squad of Panzer tanks surrounding an Allied stronghold.  They should be stopping the mouse invasion in its tracks…instead, I’m pretty sure the mice have gone stealthy on us and have either (a)  learned that the smell of peanut butter has lured too many of their buddies to death, or (b) found a new party spot.

When we moved into this house, we were fairly sure that our biggest problems in the kitchen were the ugly wallpaper, the royal blue counters, and the beat-to-hell linoleum.  Having forced the landlord to take care of the latter two issues by the end of October, and having stripped the walls down to plaster and lead paint myself, I thought our worries were over.

Our second day in the house Nic mentioned that I should pick up some mouse traps the next time I was at the store.

“Ummm…is there something you need to tell me?”  I asked.  For all I knew, mouse trap might be a euphemism for rat trap.  Or something even worse.

“I found a dead mouse in the basement.”

“A mouse or a rat?”

“A mouse.”

“You’re sure?!”

“Yes.”

Okay.  This was okay.  Mice are not rats.  They’ve never been blamed for a plague, when you screw up in front of your grandma it’s not “Oh, mice!” that you shout, and when you try to find appropriate ways to describe your bastard landlord, you aren’t calling him “a beady eyed little mouse.”

In fact, I had mice as pets as a kid.  Sebastian, Tickles, and BooBoo were all friends.  Nothing to worry about.

Until we lay down our first trap, turned our backs, and almost immediately heard a little scratching sound.

That was a little too fast.

I’d only bought two traps that day, and both were filled.  The next day, I went through all four of my traps.  This was getting a little ridiculous.  Try walking through Walmart at 10 at night carrying an armload of mouse traps and a box of swiffer wetjet wipes.  It makes you begin to question the choices you’ve made in your life.

It’s been two days since we caught a mouse.  (Which is good because the non-gross mouse traps, the ones that trap and kill the mouse and you never have to see the thing, are $2.50 a pop.)  So either they’ve gotten smarter, or we’ve gotten the majority of them.

As for the fact that there are likely one or two left, and the fact that more will no doubt attempt to move in as time passes, I’m trying to make peace with it.  We have moved into a farmhouse in the country.  Field mice are just part of that equation.  And people have lived with them for years and just dealt with it…right?  Cinderella in her ritzy house, for all of her tireless housekeeping had mice, all the Whos had mice (remember how that bastard Grinch left crumbs much too small for the other Whos mouses), on Christmas Eve not a creature was stirring…not even a mouse, and don’t even get me started on the likes of Stuart Little.

So when I see a small blur of fuzz go sprinting across the linoleum, I’ll try not to panic.  I’ll just lay down a few more traps.