And cut off their tails with a carving knife...

This morning, I went down to check the mouse traps in our basement. We've caught 4 of the little peanut-butter eating beggars in the last two weeks. Before I even got near the traps, I could hear the scratching in one and watch it move around as if possessed. (by spirits, not mice) A quick inspection showed all three traps were tripped. I picked up the closest one and it felt light. Empty. I reset it and returned it to where it was. I picked up the one in the back, leaving the moving one for last. It too, felt light. I opened it to reset it and was greeted by a little gray tail lashing out. A bumper crop today! Two mice, bringing our total to six!


As is typically the case, the mice get turned out of the traps into glass jars for the kids to watch at breakfast. The first one was a small, very terrified mouse. (Random Thought : Can a mouse be a scaredy-cat?) The mouse barely moved, but was obviously paying rapt attention to everything that was going on.

"Scaredy Mouse"

The second mouse was a much larger mouse and much to our surprise it had no tail! We figured it must have run into the Farmer's wife of childhood verse:

Three blind mice. Three blind mice.
See how they run. See how they run.
They all ran after the farmer's wife,
Who cut off their tails with a carving knife,
Did you ever see such a sight in your life,
As three blind mice?

One of DW's visitor's to her blog; AliBlahBlah suggested using the Farmer's wife's approach in a comment on DW's blog. I suggested to DW that maybe it's time for a cat. She responded that I was doing just fine. :-/

The larger, tail-less mouse (Instantly dubbed "Stubby" by DS and DD.) was bold and sat washing peanut butter out of it's fur with wild abandon. Nothing seemed to shake this mouse's resolve.

"Stubby"

I let the two mice out in the brushpile where the others have been going. People keep telling me that I'm not taking them far enough away from the house. To be honest, I'm half tempted to put a little dot of nail polish on the mice to see if I'm just catching the same two mice over, and over, and over again.

"So tell me, do I know you from somewhere?"