Oh, rats! Or mice.

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It’s started. I first heard it a few days ago. Scuffling. Scratching. Always in the early hours of the morning. No, I thought. It can’t be. Oh please let it not be. Maybe it’s just a few birds scratching on the tin roof, I reasoned desperately. Maybe it’s the neighbour’s cat on the roof? Oh please just be the neighbour’s cat!

But no…it was coming from inside the roof cavity.

I know this because one morning, the sound was so loud and irritating that I grabbed my diary (the nearest thing), climbed up on my exercise bike (aka expensive clothing hanger) and thudded it against the ceiling. The noise stopped immediately. Cheeky little bugger, I thought to myself.

I know this noise. I know this noise well. But in all the seven years we’ve lived in our current house, I have not heard this sound. Something I’ve been so relieved about. Until now.

This morning I heard the little mofo squeaking. It squeaked. Like I need any more proof.

Whenever I hear this sound, I have flashbacks. To the little buggers finding a way into the interior of my abode. The smell. The crusty little poo pellets that appear everywhere, despite your best efforts to clean them up and block all possible entries. The smell they leave when they die in the roof space. The story my brother tells of accidentally cooking a mouse in the toaster one time…

I think of Bitch-Mouse. My arch nemesis at our last house. Bitch-Mouse. This one brazen mother*cking rodent that teased me and taunted me and made my life hell. It would pop out while I was watching TV and just stare at me, before casually wandering about the house like it owned the joint. Have you ever seen a mouse out on a Sunday stroll? I have. Smug little f*cker. The moment I tried to catch it, *poof* it would disappear like a little tiny magician. I remember finally succumbing to buying a sachet of poison and placing it in our spare room (Bitch-Mouse’s personal play ground). This was BC (Before Child), might I add – not looking to poison anyone any time soon.

One night, Bitch-Mouse crawled dramatically out of the spare room. Bitch-Mouse’s struggle was real. It looked me in the eye, reached out a little accusing paw (do mice have ‘paws’?) and carked it. It was like Bitch-Mouse wanted me to see what I’d done. Like a final, “YOU KILLED ME. HOW COULD YOU.”

I felt 1% guilty. Actually, that 1% faded pretty quickly. I know. I’m a monster.

So, since then I have been excited about the fact that our house seems fairly mouse-proof. I’ve seen poo in the garden shed, but I have never spotted a live mouse in all the time we’ve lived here. I really hope my luck hasn’t run out. I have all these mental images of that mouse up there, just moved in with its little squatter mouse friends. Just making a mess, running amok, keeping terrible hours. Making bad lifestyle choices. Sleeping around with other no good mice who have no self respect. Making little mouse babies they have no intention of looking after properly. Deciding they need to start a life of crime to get by. Breaking into my pantry, eating all the food and nibbling things that shouldn’t be nibbled. Trust me, mouse (Bitch Mouse 2?), you don’t want to do this. Don’t go down that path. I’m warning you. You’ll end up in mouse jail. Or dead. Life isn’t all Disney World and Mickey and Minnie, I tell ya. I’ve met mice like you and we all know where this is going.

…And now I am talking to the invisible mouse that lives in my roof space. That’s normal, right? Can mice read?

So, tell me. What do you know about mice? 

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