Oh man. I hate those realizations. Life is always better before you realize you're living in shit.
Then I read all about how I'm going to die from the hantavirus now.
1: Yeah, the first time I lived in a place with mice it took me forever to figure that out. Another vote for office cat.
The technical term is "doots", heebie.
There used to be courtyard cats with adorable courtyard kittens. Then they were removed as unsightly, and I was made sad.
Counterpoint: A few months ago, my roommate's cat was doing some sort of emotional flip-out over the roommate's (soon-to-be-ex-) husband moving out. We eventually figured out that the cat's primary form of demonstrating this emotional state was converting the lightless dirt-floor/crawlspace-y part of the basement into his own personal 10' x 20' litterbox. Cleaning up several months worth of cat crap, while crouched in a dank, darkened dirt crawlspace ≠ fun.
8: How can you be sure it wasn't the (soon-to-be-ex-) husband using it as his own personal 10' x 20' litterbox?
Then I read all about how I'm going to die from the hantavirus now.
That link seems overly inflammatory (though I clicked through, because I just had a mouse in a trap at home this weekend, which is, thankfully, an unusual occurrence).
Since infected deer mice live throughout the state, human cases of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome can occur in any part of Washington. Typically one to five cases are reported each year.
That isn't nothing, but doesn't make it sound like an epidemic.
Instead of a mouse, it might be a rabbit with an unfortunate digestive condition.
Yeah, hantavirus is pretty rare, and not transmitted by the most common types of mice. Here's the CDC's take.
I'm pretty sure 11 is alluding to a mouse-rabbit centipede.
During the big hantavirus scare in the Southwest a while back, I remember hearing that it spreads mostly through urine rather than droppings, but that doesn't seem to be confirmed by any of these links.
15: M/tch is a purist and supports only centipede-centipede centipedes.
Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo-centipedes.
14: Do mice shit and then walk a fair bit before taking a leak? Baring evidence for that, I think mice droppings would be a very excellent marker for mice urine.
I'm trying really hard to find a parsing of 17 that's grammatical.
21: Just how many Popes are we talking about?
Buffalo which are buffaloed by buffalo in turn buffalo innocent buffalo-centipedes what never harmed nobody.
Minimum of three popes for a papal bullipede.
20: I know people who shit while sitting on wood. In fact, I expect oak toilet seats will soon be hip in the same retro kind of way as trucker hats were.
24: At long last, have you no sham, apostropher?
Do mice shit and then walk a fair bit before taking a leak?
I have no idea.
YOU KNOW THE OLD SAYING: DON'T SHIT WHERE YOU PISS
I like to imagine the mouse does a fist-pump every time it finds heebie's desk unoccupied.
This is both useful and topical (kind of), but I still wouldn't open before eating.
So based on 32, what can you tell us about the health of the mouse in question, heebie?
33: Yeah, seriously, anything you could tell me would be great, heebie. We got totally ratfucked on Health Care Reform, so I can't afford to see a medical doctor.
Glue traps seem to be effective against mice but may be objectionable to bleeding heart liberals.
I'M STILL HERE AND FEEL I HAVE A ROLE TO PLAY IN SOLVING THIS PROBLEM
Glue traps are entirely not effective enough if you want the mouse dead dead dead.
but may be objectionable to bleeding heart liberals
Oh for crying out loud. Did I miss the announcement that today was supposed to be troll day on the blog?
38: I mean, there *was* a sign posted.
37: Yes, and I don't think it makes me a bleeding heart liberal to not particularly want to consign a mouse to death by thirst.
(I came home yesterday to discover that one of the cats had very precisely skinned a toy mouse. I don't want to see what they'd do to a real one.)
LIBERAL GLUE TRAP HATERS I AM HERE FOR YOU.
40: The last mouse I caught in a glue trap died twelve hours after I set the trap (probably, as I didn't see that it was dead with my own eyes for another 8 hours). I'm guessing he waited at least a few hours before stepping in the glue. Maybe he was already in bad shape or maybe he died of something besides thirst or maybe mice get thirsty very quickly.
42: Ah. I'm mostly familiar with them from my movie theater job; they were very good at catching our vermin but then we always had to dispatch them. The people who set the traps (hired exterminators who came by...once a week? something like that) told us just to chuck them in the trash still alive but none of us could stomach that. Not my favorite job.
When Mrs y's workplace was infested by mice, they came down hard on leaving any kind of food around, which sounds obvious, but made a lot of difference quite fast. No apple core in waste bins, no biscuits in the communal area for people to help themselves, sweep up your toast crumbs and dispose of them underseal or down a drain. And so on.
Anyway, the little buggers disappeared after a while.
We had mice last year - including while I was cooling my heels with the Peabody ducks - and basically, what 44 says, with more cats. Traps will kill a mouse now and then, a cat is better.
Glue traps seem to be effective against mice but may be objectionable to bleeding heart liberals.
A very large glue trap would also be effective against bleeding-heart liberals. As would a very large cat.
Also, with reference to mice and cats: Toxo!
http://www.edge.org/documents/archive/edge307.html
Absolutely fascinating and a bit scary.
We *may* have a mouse, and our downstairs neighbors have a cat that I was absentmindedly thinking of borrowing for a day or two. Will just any cat do for catching a mouse, or does the cat have to have experience and skillz?
A glue trap, paper towel, and a hammer are quite effective at making sure your mouse doesn't get to shit on your desk ever again without any unsightly blood to trouble your bleeding heart.
Many cats totally ignore mice. It's not so much skill as whether they've been bred to it. You can only try and see.
a cat is better. Not if you're allergic.
I have thrown a living mouse into the trash, but that was years ago and I now feel bad about it. My old boss once faced a live mouse in a glue trap and solved the problem with a sheet of heavy plastic and an unabridged Webster's. At meeting with him, I would never sit by the bookshelf.
I have dispatched glued mice with a horseshoe to the neck.
I have glued a horseshoe to the neck of dispatched mice. And the fucking Tate still won't return my calls.
54: You need video.
53: That's actually a line from an early draft of Folsom Prison Blues.
The dead squirrel that was on the road this morning is gone. We either have a neighbor who is thoughtful or has an unrestrained dog.
47, 49: While a cat does need skillz to actually catch mice (prior experience or natural aptitude will do), IME even a useless bozo of a cat will usually scare the mice away for awhile. So it's helpful regardless.
I think heebie should get drunk, wait until dark and blast the mouse with a .45 like John Wayne in "True Grit". Well, I guess it was technically a rat in the movie, but still. And then of course she couldn't say that she served the rat with a writ, like the Duke had to just to win an Oscar.
even a useless bozo of a cat will usually scare the mice away for awhile
Sez you. I know all about that phony Warren T. Rat, and we got a plan!
So what's the most humane sort of trap to purchase for mice capture? We had mice, or a mouse, in the closet (you know which one) which seems to be gone now that the closet has been cleaned out, but it may well be back at any time. I confess I found droppings on my desk, and one or two near the kitchen trash can as well. Ew.
The whole thing is surely due to the absence of cats in the house, but I'm not up for another cat yet. We had four, then three, then two for another year or two, then they passed in rapid succession. I'ma take a breather on that for a while.
N.B. The snake resides in the basement now, OPINIONATED SNAKE IN CLOSET.
the closet (you know which one)
The … water … closet?
60: Are there options beyond gluetraps and the cartoon-style snap trap? As between those two, I think the latter is more humane.
There are traps that close them in so that you can drive them out to country and release them, but you lose the satisfaction of snuffing out their filthy little flames.
There are traps that close them in so that you can drive them out to country the nearest math department and release them.
62: Not always immediately lethal though. This winter I was in the kitchen at work and I heard a gentle scraping sound. Took me a few minutes to realize it was a mouse, partially imobilized by a snap trap that he or she had triggered while backwards, so that his or her tiny little front paws could, with much difficulty, drag him or herself along the tile floor. I think I just threw it in the trash, figuring the end would come soon enough. But I felt bad afterwards.
the satisfaction of snuffing out their filthy little flames.
Nah, I don't hate them. Rats would be a different matter. These are just little mice, basically field mice. This house is in the country, sort of, in the first place. Cats are the most obvious solution to a struggle over territory. I don't really have a problem with poisoning with respect to the mice, as long as it doesn't involve a lengthy and painful death. I was hoping there might be something that would, I don't know, make them pass out from asphyxiation before dying.
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I paused to listen to Obama on Iraq. Hm. Segment on the importance of domestic investment.
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So what's the most humane sort of trap to purchase for mice capture? We had mice, or a mouse, in the closet (you know which one) which seems to be gone now that the closet has been cleaned out, but it may well be back at any time..
NO IT AIN'T COMING BACK AND JUST BECAUSE I DON'T HAVE SOFT FUR AND WHISKERS DOESN'T MEAN I CAN'T GET THE JOB DONE, LADY
SNAKE wants out of the basement, m'kay? It was apparently sighted just today trying to push open the basement screen door, but when said door was opened for it, it freaked out and snuck away inside again. Oh, SNAKE.
It's my birthday! And people are calling.
These are just little mice, basically field mice shit factories for your silverware drawer.
71: Hanging out a shingle in the restaurant industry, Mobes?
68: Yes, happy birthday and thank you for the reminder because I forgot about a family member's birthday until you mentioned it.
Happy birthday to you!
And you should get a tin rat and leave the glue trap out of it. Then you can just the little sods go, free to freeze or fry or whatever.
max
['Or you could feed it to the snake.']
you should get a tin rat
Is that like the scale version of the union inflatables? MICE RUN A RAT SHOP, SAY VEIU SPOKESVOLES.
Wszystkiego najlepszego, parsimon.
Happy birthday, crazy snake lady.
Hey! Happy birthday, parsimon!
(And heal quickly, Alameida, although I know I have this in the wrong thread.)
60.1: Havahart traps 'r' the traps bleeding-♥ libruls luv.
Although you need to check them regularly for the ♥ part to work. (For instance if you don't go out back of your garage for a few days in the middle of dry spell during the summer and a squirrel gets into your groundhog-sized one it will die what looks like it must have been most gruesome death evah.) Sorry Mr. Squirrel--if there is a trans-species afterlife please don't chew my eyes out.
Thanks for birthday wishes. I don't know about the crazy snake lady part. Not as far as I know.
my dad favors the "sit up all night on the sofa, smoking killer weed, then taking the mice out individually with a .22" plan. surprisingly effective, but you have to be a damn good shot. he leaves a big hunk of parmesan on the table or counter, and they are eventually overcome and climb up to get shot. a little hard on the other sleepers in the house, though. if you factor in that my dad looks quite a bit like jack nicholson the whole thing will make more sense, in a steven king way. I must have told you this before, but when my mom was on the phone with her parents discussing getting divorced, he hacked the phone out of the wall with an axe. luckily, my godfather was there to physically restrain him from hacking her up too. really, like grabbed the axe handle below the head and wrestled it away from him. my family is stupid.
Alameida:
Does Pat Conroy know your family?