Confessions of a mouse gone wild.
So I’m a little paranoid. I’m sitting on my bed with my feet crossed and I don’t want to touch the ground. I knew we had some kind of rodent problem. I’ve done my best to secure almost every food item in hard plastic containers in the pantry. They will bust into (okay, technically chew or gnaw into) hard cardboard boxes of our wholesale items… granola bars, cereal. I mean the tough kind of cardboard… the “double bagged” stuff.
I have my packaged instant oatmeal out of the cardboard box it comes in and in Tupperware for goodness sakes!
But, they have crossed the line.
Last night I saw them TWICE in my bedroom. I thought it was a rat because it was relatively large. Today I met the culprit.. but that was before they crossed the line… I digress.
My favorite treat is dark chocolate peanut butter cups. They are not sold in a bag but in a package of 2 and can only be found at the check out counter of specific stores… Target, 7-11, and recently I found them at the Dollar Tree. But not everyone carries these amazing delicacies.
Because these items are somewhat precious to me (think of Bilbo with his ring in Lord of the Rings, okay…) I tend to keep them out of sight and out of reach of my offspring. These treats are for savoring… they help keep me straight on my WW program. I know exactly how many points they are and they keep me from feeling deprived.
Last night I went to retrieve a package of this delicious peanut butter and chocolate goodness and behold… my stash had been broken into! Now I keep these items “locked away” in a drawer. I mean I have no idea how the little devils, I mean creatures, could possibly have gotten in.
But oh, they’re sneaky. And wily. And my beautiful orange and brown wrapper was shredded in a pile…. I know there’s “no wrong way to eat a Reeses” but what if a mouse gets to it first? Oh the shame. I decided to leave the package there. I closed the drawer in sadness… what will I do with the remains of my favorite candy… I will place them on a trap. Indeed, I will bait them with the ruins of my chocolate. That will teach them!
Then this morning… I got up at 5. Got Libby & Samuel off to school. Was fixing myself some breakfast… opened the pantry… and there we met… eye to eye… face to face… from the second shelf to the top was a sweet oversized country mouse. He looked at me, not even interested, or fazed… almost this look like, “What?!” Oh well excuse me fat mouse who eats my candy. His eyes were black and shiny and unfortunately he was a bit cute. But what he did next daunted me. He nonchalantly climbed down the pantry. A shelf at a time and proceeded to stop and poop every few boxes. The nerve!
But there was this part of me that felt nervous and scared. I wanted to scream but didn’t want to wake the rest of the house up. I almost went and got our housemate, Ben. I wanted to get Christopher but didn’t want to wake up Kristin and Madison. Oh my. So what did I do.
What any other brave woman I know would do. I stood there. Slightly shocked and more paralyzed than anything. Do I dare grab that box of cereal? I literally stood there 5 minutes… intimidated by this little mouse who I’m hundreds of times bigger than.
I finally heard him munching on something on the bottom shelf… I gathered my nerve …I quickly reached in and grabbed my cereal (in one of those Tupperware containers) and backed away slowly like a robber with his hostage.
Now the question is do I love my son enough to go back to that same pantry and fix him some breakfast… Maybe he’d be happy with some cereal that I just happened to not put back ….
I have my packaged instant oatmeal out of the cardboard box it comes in and in Tupperware for goodness sakes!
But, they have crossed the line.
Last night I saw them TWICE in my bedroom. I thought it was a rat because it was relatively large. Today I met the culprit.. but that was before they crossed the line… I digress.
My favorite treat is dark chocolate peanut butter cups. They are not sold in a bag but in a package of 2 and can only be found at the check out counter of specific stores… Target, 7-11, and recently I found them at the Dollar Tree. But not everyone carries these amazing delicacies.
Because these items are somewhat precious to me (think of Bilbo with his ring in Lord of the Rings, okay…) I tend to keep them out of sight and out of reach of my offspring. These treats are for savoring… they help keep me straight on my WW program. I know exactly how many points they are and they keep me from feeling deprived.
Last night I went to retrieve a package of this delicious peanut butter and chocolate goodness and behold… my stash had been broken into! Now I keep these items “locked away” in a drawer. I mean I have no idea how the little devils, I mean creatures, could possibly have gotten in.
But oh, they’re sneaky. And wily. And my beautiful orange and brown wrapper was shredded in a pile…. I know there’s “no wrong way to eat a Reeses” but what if a mouse gets to it first? Oh the shame. I decided to leave the package there. I closed the drawer in sadness… what will I do with the remains of my favorite candy… I will place them on a trap. Indeed, I will bait them with the ruins of my chocolate. That will teach them!
Then this morning… I got up at 5. Got Libby & Samuel off to school. Was fixing myself some breakfast… opened the pantry… and there we met… eye to eye… face to face… from the second shelf to the top was a sweet oversized country mouse. He looked at me, not even interested, or fazed… almost this look like, “What?!” Oh well excuse me fat mouse who eats my candy. His eyes were black and shiny and unfortunately he was a bit cute. But what he did next daunted me. He nonchalantly climbed down the pantry. A shelf at a time and proceeded to stop and poop every few boxes. The nerve!
But there was this part of me that felt nervous and scared. I wanted to scream but didn’t want to wake the rest of the house up. I almost went and got our housemate, Ben. I wanted to get Christopher but didn’t want to wake up Kristin and Madison. Oh my. So what did I do.
What any other brave woman I know would do. I stood there. Slightly shocked and more paralyzed than anything. Do I dare grab that box of cereal? I literally stood there 5 minutes… intimidated by this little mouse who I’m hundreds of times bigger than.
I finally heard him munching on something on the bottom shelf… I gathered my nerve …I quickly reached in and grabbed my cereal (in one of those Tupperware containers) and backed away slowly like a robber with his hostage.
Now the question is do I love my son enough to go back to that same pantry and fix him some breakfast… Maybe he’d be happy with some cereal that I just happened to not put back ….
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