Of Mice and Men and Cats

I have a mouse in my ceiling, and it's driving me crazy.

This is not the first mouse that I've had in my room recently. About a month ago, a mouse peeked out from under my bed late one night, which sent me into a frenzy. I ran out of the room, threw my freeloading cat into the room to take care of it, and shut her in with the mouse. I then went to find a broom, which I brandished like a lightsaber as I waited to see if the cat would take care of business.

Naturally, my worthless cat was perfectly content to paw at the little vermin and chase it around the room, but she wouldn't go in for the kill. The mouse escaped under my door, which caused me to squeal like a girl and bounce around the room in a comical fashion. My attempts to swat the mouse were futile. Frightened mice are surprisingly agile.

So like the coward that I am, I drafted my brother into the fight. This was, I might add, just after midnight, and he wasn't too pleased about the ruckus I was making. The two of us managed to corner the little critter and smack it with the broom.

If you're reading this and preparing to yell "ANIMAL CRUELTY!!" then you best just stop right now.

I have no love of mice. If they're in my space, they best be prepared to meet their rodent maker. You can imagine my mindset then when I discovered that something had chewed through and devoured almost half of the secretly-stashed Snickers bar that I was hiding on the top shelf of my closet. It didn't take a zoologist to deduce that a mouse was responsible. For over a year, the ceiling tile in my closet has been missing, so I figured the candy-raider had been using my closet as his own personal lunch buffet.

I quickly disposed of the offending Snickers bar, and I managed to craft a replacement ceiling tile for my closet. I couldn't find the mouse, and I really didn't want to find it. He was scurrying around somewhere above the suspended ceiling in our basement, so he had the high ground. Instead, I procured some mouse poison, and I stuffed a whole box of it up in my ceiling yesterday morning. I figured that would nail the little fucker.

Last night at about 2:30 in the morning as I was getting ready for bed (too much time spent Googling "Toaster fetish" I guess), I heard a distinct skittering in my ceiling. There was no doubt in my mind that Ralph had returned (sans motorcycle). I literally cackled with glee as I heard him head straight for where I'd planted the mouse poison. I figured he'd be dead within minutes. I'm a sick human being.

What I failed to realize is that mouse poison is slow-acting. I learned today that it could take up to four days for Ralph to kick the bucket. The dose of poison in each pellet is intentionally kept small so that the mouse will eat it. This did not bode well for the rest of my night. Not only was Ralph still alive, he apparently brought in his own stash of Mouse Meth because he was going ape-shit up in my ceiling. He was skittering all over the place. Not being a big fan of mice, and not being particularly convinced that the ceiling was completely sealed, I couldn't fall asleep.

It didn't help when I started hearing my cat going nuts out in the next room (Miss Cleo does NOT sleep with me very often... unless I decide that I WANT to wake up with claw marks in my abdomen). Apparently, Ralph was bolting across the ceiling into the next room and peeking out where a few ceiling tiles are missing. This was not pleasing Miss Cleo since she could clearly see her desired prey, but she couldn't get to him. Under different circumstances, I would have found this highly entertaining; Cleo leaping straight up into the air trying to jump into the ceiling is actually a pretty impressive-looking feat. Unfortunately, she's also incredibly loud. So I have a meth-head mouse darting around in my ceiling and an overzealous fatass cat believing she was fucking Batman. Sleep was not forthcoming.

Miss Cleo in rare action shot

I tried to go upstairs to sleep on the couch for a bit, but since my dad wakes up at 5:30 in the morning (these people with their legitimate jobs and lives), this was not a long-term solution. Fortunately, when I came back downstairs an hour later (keep in mind, it's now like 4:30 in the morning), the cat was sleeping on the chair, and Ralph must have crashed because I couldn't hear anything. I turned on the radio and drifted off to sleep around 5:30 a.m.

This morning, I went to the store and bought two more containers of mouse poison, and I put them in the ceiling as well. If Ralph is still alive, he won't be for long. What I love about mouse poison is the horiffically ironic death that it provides. The poison causes the mouse to get incredibly hungry, which causes the mouse to eat more poison.... which causes the mouse to eventually eat so much that he literally gorges himself to death. At least, that's what one website promised. That website was trying to garner sympathy for mice, but I rubbed my hands with delight knowing that the candy-pilfering, meth-popping mouse in my ceiling was going to meet a gruesome fate!

I don't like mice. Although they're not nearly as creepy as spiders and cockroaches, they still freak me out. I have no desire to see one in my room again. The sooner Ralph's corpse starts to stink up my ceiling the better! He should be dead by Christmas Eve.

Happy Holidays, Ralph! Rest in pieces you little bastard!

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I HATE THOSE MEECES TO PIECES!!!