Nocturnal Terrorists!

I feel terrorized in my own house these last few weeks.  It starts when the lights go out and the dreaded scratching and scurrying sounds around the house and in the walls begin!  Darn these volatile, vindictive, vermin with their cute little whiskers and twitchy noses sniffing for food.  And why does their name rhyme with something so lovely, so "nice"?

You got it... MICE!

Reluctantly, I reach over to turn my nightlight off... nuzzle into my blankets hesitantly while half listening for the dreaded sound of their presence.  Those little buggers wait until you've just about drifted off to sleep before they start playing with you mind.

Scratch, scratch, SCRATCH!

It doesn't matter how quickly you can turn that lamp back on, when that light flicks on there is nothing to be seen!  You sit there listening, barely breathing while precious minutes of much-needed sleep tick past until finally you resolve to turn the light back off and go back to sleep.  Only to have the blasted game start all over again!

It's terrorism, I tell you!

And with a pregnancy bladder, putting my feet on the floor is NOT a welcomed notion in the middle of the night for fear one will run up my leg!

We have managed to catch seven mice so far... yes, SEVEN!  After months of Sabbath preps NOT including making a Challah loaf, this past Friday I finally managed to make TWO of them!  I was so happy.  Finally a sense of accomplishment for breaking of the bread and sharing the grape juice!  But the next morning, those little buggers managed to chew through my loaf bags and burrow, yes BURROW, into my challah loaves!  One loaf, fine.  But why did they ruin both of them those little gluttonous, gruesome good-for-nothing challah-ruining ego-bursting rodents!

In case you haven't picked up on it... I'm slightly angry and fed up with this.

And our dear Sivana who scoots around the floor like a vaccum cleaner picking up everything and anything she finds and putting it in her mouth... including mouse poop!  Thankfully I have been able to catch a few in time before they dissolved like little disease pellets in her mouth but I shudder at the thought of those which I did not find!

I dread nightime.  Last night, Duane worked a night shift and Anika cried and cried, screaming of an ear ache from 1:00 a.m. til 3:00 a.m.  Finally at 3:00 she stopped crying and I lay there for thirty minutes wound up from trying not to lose it on my daughter.  With each moment that I was not sleeping, I was getting angrier and angrier until finally sleep came over me and I began to slip into la-la land only to be rudely awaked by a huge SNAP sound.

The snap sound was immediately followed by that blasted familiar sound of frantic scratching until it slowed down and stopped.  On went the night light.  I was determined to find this little bugger!  I grabbed my shoe and headed towards the corner I heard the noise from.  I found a mouse trap Duane had placed there and realized now it was the sound of the mouse trap snapping on the mouse's face that woke me up and the resulting desperate scratches that have come to sound like nails on a chalk board to me.  There it was, motionless.  And there I was with zero sympathy.  None.  Zippo.

"Take that you little bugger!"

Yep, zero sympathy folks.  Pretty heartless but my first thought was "finally, one more down... probably fifteen more to go."  Even as I type this at almost midnight, I can hear them.  Like little ghosts haunting our house with noises you cannot catch with your eyes.  Hmmm, does that sentence even make any sense?

My feet are up on my chair (not too comfortable) as I dread one running past my feet as it did the other day.  That one resulted in high pitched screams and a surprising STOMP of my foot... which happened to crush it.  Truly not a lovely moment.

The house is riddled with sticky tapes, mouse traps tempting them with dabs of sunbutter and even ultrasonic devices that make horribly annoying buzzing sounds.  One mouse got stuck in the tape but managed to drag himself to a hole in the wall where he used it as leverage to rip his tail off to free himself.

Yep, to make things worse, somewhere in my house is a tail-less mouse.  Either that or something ate the mouse that was stuck in the tape and left its tail... this thought is no more comforting than the first!

I am a prisoner in my own home, terrorized by the pitter patter of rodent feet, trying to lay claim to our house... and nearly succeeding.

So my dear friends, I ask for the power of your prayers once more.  Would you join with me in a prayer to our Father begging Him to kindly get rid of any wildlife that does not belong inside a house?  And that He not twist the request by the house burning down (got rid of the rodents, didn't it?) or by some other double-edged form?

Oh those darn scritch scratches... they are in the kitchen just behind me right now.  I set up around some grain with sticky tapes around it... hang on... I'm gonna go check... my heart is already pounding...

It's now twenty minutes later as I have been nearly outsmarted by a mouse, yet again!  Went into the kitchen and nothing was in the sticky tape traps but I heard scurrying on the kitchen counter.  Sure enough, I moved everything where I heard the mouse go and he started squeaking something fierce but no sign of him anywhere!  It sounded like he was behind my Bose docking station so I kept moving it over to look behind it but nothing... until I moved the Bose station and realized there was a nice little hole in the back of it.  The mouse is currently in my Bose docking station so I stood there for ten minutes with the only tool I could find handy (which happened to be my garlic press) ready to whack the vermin when he finally came crawling back out.  Apparently mice have more patience than humans.  So I put the sticky tape at the base of the hole, tried blaring some music hoping it would make him scoot right out of there but nearly woke up Sivana instead.  No wonder mice outlive every living condition!  So I am back at the computer hoping that with the kitchen lights off once more and my angry breathing no longer nearby, Mr.Mouse will come out and find himself stuck to that tape!

I'm sure you all have better things to do than read my play-by-play of trying to catch stupid mice.  I'm sure I have better things to do than blog about them!  Sigh.  12:32 and sleep is not looking promising yet again.

So please, please, please pray that God get rid of these blasted mice once and for all.

And may this find you out there, hopefully sleeping and free of the torment of rodents ruling your home at night.  May you rest peacefully knowing that all is well.  And if you happen to be facing mice troubles, then know you are not alone.  From this terrorized insomniac to you, we'll battle those little suckers together!

Good night everyone.  God bless you!