rodents running rampant = total eclipse of the heart

i killed another mouse late last night.

i didn't want to. really, i didn't. i even tried a few times to capture it safe and soundly so i could put it in a box then take it far away and let it go to get into someone else's house. tragically this mouse's innate ability to dodge, dip, duck, dive and dodge ultimately led to it's own untimely demise. how greek.

see, there's been a bit of a mouse problem in the house lately. this presents a rather unique dilemma and conflict inside my mind. one the one hand, i don't want mice scampering about, chewing up my stuff, defecating and urinating all over my stuff, smelling the place up worse than i do, and eventually luring in the natural predators that follow mice, namely snakes. i truly have no desire to dodge a rattlesnake on my way sleepily to the bathroom in the middle of the night. so it would appear to be pretty cut and dry as to what needs to be done: relentless eradication of every last one. however, on the other hand, i am an animal lover, to a fault. i have a special weakness for small, cute, furry little animals, probably because i had pet rodents most of my childhood and really loved them and played with them a lot. i have many cherished memories of me awesome gerbils. i had my pirate gerbil that would ride around on my shoulders, my extreme pilot gerbil that could deftly navigate our little house in one of those little plastic orbs at full-speed, etc. so when i see the cute fuzzy little bodies of mice scurrying around my room, my first thought is actually happiness. i want to play with them! i want to be their friend and have them talk to me.

alas, simple logic must win out, and i must rid the room and house of these vermin disguised as happiness. the other unfortunate thing is that the mouse traps which have been provided are probably the most inhumane way of catching a mouse possible. it is simply a index card size sticky pad, ultra sticky. one foot on it, and they're pretty much done. however, its not like a venus mouse trap, it doesn't eat them after it has captured them, it merely detains them until they starve to death, often in a rather unenjoyable position that they have managed to get themselves into due to a panic-driven struggle to escape. it is truly wicked in the sickest sense. i feel so bad when i see them, stuck in their own personal tar baby, pleading with their frenzied, horror filled eyes. its even worse when they squeak for their lives, its so pathetic and pitiful, the swan song of a mouse on death row.

because of my nature of staying up very late, i am usually awake when they rise and scamper joyfully about. ironically, this makes me the best suited to catch them, since i see where they're playing around, put a trap there, and, like clockwork, i will have captured a mouse within a minute or two.

i feel filthy, like a murderer must feel immediately afterwords. well, not a psychopathic, sadistic murderer, but an actual humane murderer who accidentally killed someone in a fit of rage or by not paying attention to the road. i had caught a few and had just thrown them away, but i could still hear them squeak. some strange, twisted version of the beating heart from poe's poem. the last one i put out of his misery before throwing him unceremoniously into the trash. i know it's just a mouse, but i still didn't like the knowledge that a few minutes before, the little bundle of lifeless fluff was once full of life and probably jovial at the prospect of a new day exploring my closet.

i guess i just say this as some weird some of therapy. until some imbalanced lunatic from peta reads this and tells me i should indeed let the animals consume my house. then this will switch from therapy to perturbed amusement tinged with mild disgust.

in the end, as much of a monster as i am, i don't think i ever would have been able to shoot old yeller.