Oh, you noticed the change in the title, have you? There is a good reason for that. Here are the continuing adventures of our battle of wits with the rodent who threatened our home and our sanity. If you missed the earlier article, you can read it here: Of Mice and Men
The scratching started up again, and with a sigh, my husband, at my prompting got to banging. I coached him on technique and frequency. When the mouse fell silent, we would retreat back to the couch to wait. Then the noise would start up again. At one point I suggested using the vacuum cleaner to suck the mouse out of the wall.
I suppose I got the idea from watching the family movie, Mouse Hunt. Even though that method didn’t turn out so well for the home owners, I figured it might be worth a shot. I was getting desperate. And for anyone who is a mouse rights activist, instead of throwing stones at me about the harmful treatment of mice, please feel free to come over and gently coax the mouse to safety. Guaranteed that after the first 20 minutes, you will be ready to throw your stones at the mouse instead.
“No,” my husband said, shaking his head. “I don’t think it would fit.”
“What do you mean?” Panic started slowly crawling up my insides.
“Judging from the sound and the size of the last one that I found (just outside of the garage a few weeks ago), it is big. Very big.”
“A rat?”
He nodded.
I thought about long sharp teeth, red eyes and the bubonic plague. Would our insurance cover the bubonic plague. Your mind goes everywhere at once when it is 4 am, I guess. “So is it really a rat?”
“We need,” he paused for emphasis. “The shop vac.”
Scratch…scratch..scratch…
Check back again to find out what happened next.
Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, technology in the Computing Blog, and creating a home in the Home Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.
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