Mice, infinite wisdom and the Way of the Universe

Ok, so about a month and a half ago a mouse found his way to the space underneath my bathroom floor. Every morning between 4 and 4:20 he would begin his morning routine.

"Scratch scratch scratch- nibble nibble- scratch"

Every morning. Now, I'm all for animal rights and PETA and all that stuff, but at 4AM, I'm not happy about being awakened by some little rodent sharpening his teeth some 6 feet from my pillow.

At first I would get up and walk into the bathroom and stomp my feet. This worked wonderfully- for about 27 seconds, or the amount of time it took me to get back to my warm bed and snuggle in for another half hour of sleep before my alarm went off. Then it would start again.
"Scratch scratch scratch- nibble nibble- scratch"

I tried covering my head with a pillow. That didn't work because I SWEAR I could still hear that horrendous little beast gnawing on the floor boards. It got to the point that I was having fantasies about his demise. I'd imagine what it would be like to set a trap- not the 'have a heart' variety- no no no.. the 'break it's scrawny neck instantly' variety- and I'd hear him one morning...

"Scratch scratch scratch- nibble nibble- SNAP!!"

Ahhh.. vengeance would be mine. Revenge would be sweet. Sleep would be sweeter.

But then, as suddenly as the pest began his reign of terror, resulting in my sleep deprivation, he ended it. I joyfully imagined that he met some horrible end and that perhaps his scrawny carcass was owl fodder. Sleep returned and again the alarm clock was the most annoying thing to awaken me in the mornings.

And then it all changed. The universe got even with me for wishing the poor defenseless beast's gruesome death. Tuesday morning I got up at the usual time in the usual manner. I let the dog out (another rodent-like beast), took my shower and toddled out into my room to get dressed. I swung open the tapestry that serves as a closet door and the smell hit me like a brick. Dead mouse. Stinky dead mouse. The horrid beast had crawled in the closet and died. I'd say about a week ago, by the smell of it.

Serves me right.

So that evening the boys and I pull everything out of the closet. We open boxes, carefully and glove laden; we paw through everything, hoping to find the rotting carcass, but to no avail. He'd died somewhere between the walls and I would have to learn to live with it, at least for a little while.

The next time I go to Mall-wart I'll buy a Renuzit thingie and inhale the smell of dead rodent thinly masked by 'Spring Rain'. In the meantime, lesson learned. Live and let live- and learn to ignore the annoying noises made by the pesky rodents with whom I seem to live, because it's far preferable to the smell they make when they die in unreachable places.