MOUSE HOUSE

I live in an old house.  It's not super-old by New England standards.  It's maybe about 200 years old, and it was built on old farmland.  It may have even been the carriage house at some point.  Yup -- I'm probably living in an old barn surrounded by ghosts of cow pies.

The house is so old that it has some creatures sharing the walls -- silverfish, ants, and an occasional field mouse.  Now, though, my stone basement has some real mice in it.  I've managed to kill a few by poisoning them.  I know this because my landlady mentions that the mice are eating the bait then crawling to the unoccupied side (that she owns) and dying on the floor over there.

Despite traps set, the damn mice are avoiding the spring-loaded peanut butter snacks, so I throw down even more poison plus some anti-mouse tricks of peppermint-based expensive remedies.  Today, I finally catch one of the little bastards on my own.  Well, I don't actually catch it.  It eats the poison and meets its end buns-up-kneeling on the floor at the base of the stairs.

Usually I creep down the stairs and peek carefully, almost fearfully, at the unsprung traps.  Actually, I have been so successful in deterring the little shits that I'm overly confident heading down to do laundry.  Instead of my slow creep down into the semi-lit basement, I almost skip happily down.  I have the silly and insane belief that I have won the battle of the mice.

Well, my rigor-mortis buddy convinces me that the battle has really just begun.  Instead of buying more of the expensive stuff at the store, I mix up a spray of peppermint and water, and I spray down the areas of highest mouse-evidence (and the scene of the crime).

I don't know if I will win this battle, but it truly is an old house.  I'm just not willing to share it.