Monday night, December 14. A creature was stirring. Even Steven's a louse.
Somewhere in my senility or dotage, I must have done something not-good. WHY would Even Steven bestow upon me a new horror in my dark basement lair?
Actually, I was in the NASCAR bathroom right next to my dark basement lair. I had just done my business. I stood in my Doc Ortho black socks (I take my shoes off in the bathroom. Kind of like George Costanza taking off his shirt. Not to feel free, but to lessen the two inches the soles add in bending my knees more sharply when I sit and stand), turning to hit the flush handle.
EEEEEEK!
Something ran along the floorboard trim! Scurried! Something tiny! Brown! Furry!
Sweet Gummi Mary! It was hiding behind the wastebasket.
"NO! GIT!"
I moved the wastebasket, and that furry scurrier darted to the corner.
"NO! YOU STUPID MOUSE! GIT!"
Furry Scurrier darted behind the toilet. Came out the other side, by the plunger and brush. Turned and went back to the corner. Back behind the wastebasket. Back to the corner under the built-in wooden counter with the airbrushed NASCARs on top. Sat there.
Well. What was I supposed to do? It was 2:00 a.m. Those sugarplum dreamers were not going to dash to my rescue. I left him there. Surely you didn't think I'd put on my New Balance and stomp him. Surely you didn't think I could catch him. That's what men are for.
It was tiny. Less than two inches, I'd say. I didn't even notice a tail. WHAT IF IT'S NOT A MOUSE? Maybe it's a baby mole! Come to think of it, I didn't see the big ears of the field mice that have been the previous invaders at the cold snap. And it wasn't the mousy gray color. It was dark brown.
I told Farmer H at 7:00 a.m. that we had a mouse. And that I couldn't set the snap-traps, because I'd set them off by the time I got bent over to put them on the floor. He said I could get traps when I went to town.
What in the NOT-HEAVEN? That's a MAN'S JOB! The nerve of him, thinking I would buy my own mousetraps!
"They have them at the grocery store."
"I've never seen mousetraps in the grocery store."
"Well. The Dollar Store would have them."
"What are YOU doing? Why don't YOU get them. I'M not going to buy mousetraps."
Farmer H agreed to pick some up while HE was in town.
More tomorrow, as the situation develops.
Why is it a man's job to buy the mousetraps? I'd buy them, then once the mouse is trapped, the man does his part by removing the evidence.
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteWhy is it a woman's job to buy all the food? EVERY WEEK! FOR ETERNITY! The way I see it, a man is going to set that trap, and eventually empty that trap. So he might as well be the one to pick it out, a model he will feel comfortable with. Same as I pick out the food that I'm going to be preparing. At least a man only has to go once a year (more or less, depending on the vermin problem in the household), and not EVERY SINGLE WEEK!
It's not like there's a mousetrap display at the grocery store. Farmer H got them at Lowe's, a lumber/hardware chain he goes to all the time for other stuff. He was actually there to get materials for a new THEMED SHED he wants to start, but they didn't have what he wanted at the right price.
It's a man's job because if the trap YOU buy doesn't work right away, it will be because you bought the wrong brand.
ReplyDeleteSioux,
ReplyDeleteI DID buy the snap-traps once, when I was in the Devil's Playground. Genius must have caught his own finger about 20 times, trying to set it and place it in my lair. Heh, heh! That experience could only have been more rewarding if it was Farmer H rather than Genius.
You raise a good point and so does Sioux. The person doing the setting and removing should be the one to choose and buy the traps. I also think that the food shopping should occasionally be done by the men in the family, but only if you are prepared to prep and eat what they've chosen. Or if the men in the family can follow a shopping list made by the prepper and cooker.
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteThe Pony does my shopping at The Devil's Playground. He is great at following a list.
Farmer H did it ONCE, at a local grocery store, right before I had Baby Genius. He LOST the list, and came home with $35 worth of cakes and cookies and ice cream. It was the days before cell phones. Farmer H said he thought about asking the manager to use the store phone to call and ask what I'd wanted, but then decided I might be mad. You know. Madder than having him bring him $35 worth of cakes and cookies and ice cream. When at the time I had gestational diabetes, and HE was free to eat all the sugar humanly possible.