The Mouse in the House

When I was a kid, I grew up with my dad setting mouse traps almost constantly. Mice were not a big deal to me. They scurry around, eat the bread you leave on the counter, and are generally gross. But other than that, I have never been bothered.


Even when I came home and made myself tomato soup and found a very dead mouse in the bottom of my trashcan, I didn't care. I mean, now the mouse was dead.


It was only until this morning that mice started to bother me.


I woke up like a usually do, hopped into the kitchen, and started making my smoothie. I was popping fruit and honey and yogurt in the blender, rubbing my cheeks, and admiring the snowfall outside, when to my utter dismay, I noticed little black pellets on my stovetop.


I grimaced. More mice? I thought. So I went fishing around in my drawers, remembering that there was a mouse trap in there somewhere.


I pulled out the little do-hickey, slathered on some peanut butter, and set it. I will admit, it scared me to set it. Dad had always made it look so easy! It wasn't though. And I found out the reason they worked so well was because they were set very precariously on a lip just inside the plastic yellow cheese.


I put the trap on my counter and waited.


Of course I knew that the little bastard wasn't going to just waltz up there while I was home, so I made plans with my little brother to go sledding, and then taking him out for an early dinner at my workplace.


Alex finally got off school and headed over. I got dressed, we got in the car, and headed to the "sledding spot," Art Hill. We had a ton of fun when we were finally able to use the sleds. It may have needed some improvisation on our parts, since our sleds were made for more snow, but we were finally careening down the huge hill, and laughing our asses off.


We went to my work, and I talked with all my coworkers. Our server was Kevin, who had thrown the Halloween party, and I realized how eerily similar my little brother and Kevin were. They talked for almost twenty minutes about Kevin's creepy mustache.


We ate our food, and my manager gave me an employee discount, which Alex has decided should be the name of his band. We thanked everyone, I gave some people hugs, and headed home.


When we were parked in my parking spot, I remembered about the mouse. I excitedly told Alex I would come over to mom's in a few, and ran home. I creaked open the door, afraid that the mouse might just now be taking the bait.


Fortunately, the trap had already done it's work. The mouse was good and dead, and really stiff. I excitedly took pictures of the little bugger, then grabbed the trap as I headed out the door to my mom's. I threw his dead body into the woods, wiped my hands, and headed to mom's. My work here was done!