I Owe My Mother...

(This came across my email a few months ago. Whoever wrote it MUST have known my mother! So I immediately forwarded it to my sister who immediately wrote back with, 'Did you write this?' "Oh hell no! I'm not that creative but it DOES sound like MOM doesn't it?")

1. My mother taught me TO APPRECIATE A JOB WELL DONE. "If you're going to kill each other, do it outside. I just finished cleaning."

2. My mother taught me RELIGION."You better pray that will come out of the carpet."

3. My mother taught me about TIME TRAVEL."If you don't straighten up, I'm going to knock you into the middle of next week!"

4. My mother taught me LOGIC."Because I said so, that's why!"

5. My mother taught me MORE LOGIC."If you fall out of that swing and break your neck, you're not going to the store with me."

6. My mother taught me FORESIGHT."Make sure you wear clean underwear, in case you're in an accident."

7. My mother taught me IRONY"Keep crying, and I'll give you something to cry about."

8. My mother taught me about the science of OSMOSIS."Shut your mouth and eat your supper."

9. My mother taught me about CONTORTIONISM"Will you look at that dirt on the back of your neck!"

10. My mother taught me about STAMINA."You'll sit there until all that spinach is gone."

11. My mother taught me about WEATHER."This room of yours looks as if a tornado went through it."

12. My mother taught me about HYPOCRISY."If I told you once, I've told you a million times. Don't exaggerate!"

13. My mother taught me the CIRCLE OF LIFE"I brought you into this world, and I can take you out."

14. My mother taught me about BEHAVIOR MODIFICATION."Stop acting like your father!"

15. My mother taught me about ENVY."There are millions of less fortunate children in this world who don't have wonderful parents like you do."

16. My mother taught me about ANTICIPATION."Just wait until we get home."

17. My mother taught me about RECEIVING."You are going to really get it when you get home!"

18. My mother taught me MEDICAL SCIENCE."If you don't stop crossing your eyes, they are going to freeze that way."

19. My mother taught me ESP."Put your sweater on; don't you think I know when you are cold?"

20. My mother taught me HUMOR."When that lawn mower cuts off your toes, don't come running to me."

21. My mother taught me HOW TO BECOME AN ADULT."If you don't eat your vegetables, you'll never grow up."

22. My mother taught me GENETICS."You're just like your father."

23. My mother taught me about my ROOTS."Shut that door behind you. Do you think you were born in a barn?"

24. My mother taught me WISDOM."When you get to be my age, you'll understand what I am saying."

25. And my favorite: My mother taught me about JUSTICE."One day you'll have kids, and I hope they turn out just like you!"

And it did come to pass....

These Aren't Mickey & Minnie Mouse I'm Battling!

Mice.

Usually people are battling them as it's getting cold when they come in looking for shelter and food. So why am I all of a sudden plagued by mice like it's the medieval days? Good question but I still don't know the answer. I just know that I've got a big mouse problem and it's gross. And growing.

I've been seeing their little calling cards laying around here and there throughout the winter. But living (sort of) out in the country I learned a long time ago that we would be getting visits from all kinds of unpleasant creatures. Such as those huge horrible spiders that I think they call wood spiders or tree spiders. I'm not sure about that but my grandmother told me that they come around when you live on a farm or have a lot of trees on your property. And since we live where the houses are spread far apart and there are woods surrounding us to some extent I learned quickly that we deal with spiders, snakes and mice. Not to mention the raccoons and opossums that wander onto your deck or rummage around in your trash cans looking for food. The first time I saw one of those spiders I about had heart failure at his size. His body was as big as or bigger than a quarter and that didn't include his hairy legs. My grandmother said, "Well step on him! You're bigger than he is!" My response was something like, "Are you kidding? What if he grabs my foot and twists it off?" So she goes stomping out there with her "grandmother" shoes and knocks him to the ground and plows her foot straight down on top of him with all her might. Spider innards went squirting out from each side of her foot as she gave me a disapproving look like, "You city people are such babies!"

We're not city people anymore! Now I deal with critters. So on Monday after dropping mom off at the grocery store for her 2 hour shopping trip (that is another story altogether) I came home to work on a paper for school. I opened my front door to be assaulted with Mice Smell! I wrinkled my nose and waved my hand back and forth in front of my face trying to dissipate the odor. "Oh My God! Where is that horrid smell coming from?" I call Dwight to report the offensive smell and he informs me that he smelled it too before leaving and discovered that a mouse must have crawled under the fridge and died. He further informs me that a few nights before he had heard the fan in the fridge make a clunking noise and something fell. Then Toby sat there with his head cocked staring at the refrigerator for a long while. He believes a mouse may have met his death in the fan and is now lying there bloating up and smelling like something the CSI team might investigate. Ah the smell of decomp.

Great. Just friggin' wonderful.

The night before we had bought new traps and baited them with cheese and sat them in the office, the kitchen and the living room. By morning we had emptied them and reset them again. Ah, the power of cheese! The little bastards have been on my desk rummaging around and shredding up precious pictures. I've been scanning them and have laid them aside not expecting mice to chew them up. Plus I have a room where I burn incense, light candles and just listen to music or meditate. It's got lots of pillows on the floor and some book shelves. The little shits have been on my bookshelves leaving their 'presents' for me. Wandering over my tarot bags making them smell "mousey". I feel so violated! So this is war. These aren't Mickey and Minnie Mouse. They must DIE!

I suggested Dwight bring up the older vacuum that has paper bags we can throw away afterwards. I use it downstairs to suck up bird seed and this way we can just toss it out. I heard him yell and come stumbling up the steps with it. "What in heavens name is wrong?"

"No less than 5 baby mice ran out of the vacuum just now. We're overrun with mice!" He was shocked and horrified.

Pulling out the fridge revealed an apparent mouse cemetery. Why we haven't smelled the little bastards after they died is beyond me. I don't even want to think we got used to the odor. I don't think that's it. I think the DCon we put out last year dried them up after they died before they could rot. Oh my God it was a disgusting mess. The back had to come off the refrigerator and a mouse nest removed. It took hours to clean it all up. While he did that I busied myself rearranging our bedroom. I really didn't want to participate in the mouse fiasco.

We decided we needed to pull a President Bush and order a Shock and Awe against the mouse population in our home. We set traps everywhere we could think of. Downstairs around the bird cages, traps got set. Some with cheese and some with peanut butter. They seem to like the seed the birds throw on the floor. I also set one in my "room" downstairs. It didn't take long, maybe overnight and the traps filled up. Snapping every few hours. We'd hear them snap and then laugh maniacally. The piles of DCon are rapidly disappearing. There isn't any point in going through and cleaning up after them until they're all gone. I'm amazed and disgusted at the same time at how many there are and we're still killing them.

Apparently they're coming in around the electrical feed through the conduit which seems to have separated. Then they run down through the electrical box and into the house. This particular piece of conduit cannot be gotten to without ripping off the deck. They seem to breed like rabbits. I thought it was bad last year when we seemed to be overwhelmed by ants but mice really take the cake. No pun intended.

If this doesn't get rid of them I may have to call General Norman Schwarzkopf and get some tips on winning this war. I'm just horrified.