Sep. 8: A creature was stirring

I couldn’t fall asleep last night. After tossing for an hour I finally gave up and went downstairs. I turned on my computer and then the family room light and noticed a very slight movement on the floor out of the corner of my eye. I thought, weird, I don’t think the A/C is on. It wasn’t.

Before I go on, a warning for Lori: you may want to stop reading now.

I kept an eye on the spot where I was pretty sure I hadn’t imagined seeing that very slight movement. It was among a mass of cables and cords near Vic’s computer. No more action—whew, it was all in my imagination.

But wait, there’s more! I wouldn’t advise Lori to stop reading if the story ended there.

My peripheral vision caught something again a couple minutes later. And then I saw a mouse. And then I said a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad word.

I’m not afraid of mice; I actually like most rodents. Katie’s second grade classroom had a hamster and the kids were always amazed when I asked to carry him around, like adults aren’t supposed to like cute, cuddly things. I’m also not afraid of snakes, although I’m not quite as excited about cuddling them.

However, I don’t like to be surprised by wild critters. And I certainly don’t want them in my house if they’re not caged.

So I sat frozen in my desk chair, watching the mouse. It was actually a really cute little thing, but I definitely didn’t like the idea of it running around my house. I didn’t know what to do. You see a spider in your house, you make your brave husband stomp on it, right? A fly or a bee or a mosquito? Get the flyswatter. But a mouse? Geez, what the H-E-double-hockeysticks are you supposed to do when you see a mouse?

It disappeared behind the couch, and then suddenly it was running along the back of the couch and I was starting to feel a little creeped out because, y’know, I sometimes hang out on that couch. It disappeared again and soon showed up back in the cords. Casey, who follows me everywhere, even in the middle of the night, came downstairs right about then. I’m thinking, cool; a rat terrier is the next best thing to a cat, right? She’ll pounce and I’ll have a ‘brave doggie’ story to tell. But Casey curled up on the rug at my feet and fell asleep. Worthless damn dog.

Vic rearranged the garage over the weekend and found evidence of at least one mouse, so he set an electronic trap. I moved it indoors, to the prime spot right next to all the cords. I thought the peanut butter inside would be irresistible but the mouse didn’t go near it. Instead, just when I thought maybe it had disappeared for good, I saw it run in front of the fireplace and behind the bookcase in the corner. The cute little mouse stopped looking quite so cute and much more evil and menacing. And because at this rate its next move would be down the wall right to where I was sitting, I decided maybe I was tired after all and quickly went back to bed, hoping the mouse couldn’t figure out how to climb the stairs.

This morning I got up early to see if the trap light was flashing, indicating a “prize.” It wasn’t. And I said that same terrible, horrible, no good, very bad word.

I’ll keep you posted, Internet.