I kinda like mice. If they didn’t chew the wiring and shit all over the place, I’d probably let ’em stay.
There’s a lot to like about them. They’re undeniably cute. They’re surprisingly smart. And they’re admirably sociable, working together efficiently and bonding in ways that many humans could do well to learn from. Mice have a certain charm. A furry je ne sais quois. I always felt that dolt Mickey portrayed them in a poor light.
But, ya know, at the end of the day they gotta go. Hit the bricks Charlie, I gave at the office.
I had a serious mouse infestation a few years back. The basement was crawling with them, literally. Mouse poop in the skillet, the whole nine yards. Turns out they were probably attracted to the fancy cat litter I’d been using, which was made out of wheat. Not my smartest move ever.
I don’t eat meat for a variety of reasons, one being that I don’t want to partake, even indirectly, in the killing of other mammals. So I wasn’t about to lay down any of those nasty glue traps or spread poison around the house, especially since I had a cat.
Oh yeah, the cat. That should’ve taken care of it, right? Not so fast.
As in, my cat wasn’t so fast. She was a timid geriatric, always more of a lover than a fighter. Well into her teens, she had zero inclination to hunt and left the little critters unmolested. More likely to just stare at them quizzically and then turn to me for answers. You see that? What the fuck’s going on around here?
And then there’s the mice themselves. More and more of them have this weird zombie disease called Taxoplasmosis that makes them unafraid of cats. Long story. Probably the second sign of the apocalypse.
But whatever the case, mice and cat were happily co-existing, she shitting into the wheat-filled box, them shitting all over the fuckin’ place, and me unwilling to get all medieval on them. What to do?
The first thing I tried was ignoring them. That doesn’t work.
The second thing I tried were humane traps. The mice go into this little tunnel and get caught, then you release them into the woods far from your home, where they probably get eaten by an owl.
That worked once. But I mentioned they’re smart, right? The rest of them figured it out and that was that.
I went back to ignoring them while I searched for another strategy. But I couldn’t ignore them the day a baby mouse got caught in an empty 5 gallon bucket in the basement. Must’ve climbed in somehow and couldn’t get back
My basement had become a mouse soap opera.
Finally I went to the hardware store and got some of those devices you plug into the wall socket. They send a very high pitched sound along the neutral wire of your electrical system. The mice hate it. The geriatric cat can’t hear it, and of course neither can you.
I bought a basket of them. Gave a few to my neighbors on either side because I live in a rowhouse and actually like my neighbors. Didn’t wanna screw them over by having all the mice just run from my place to theirs.
Sonofagun. It actually worked. Before I knew it, all the mice were gone, from my place and my neighbors’. Once in a while life comes together, a little patience and research paying off.
Fast forward a few years. Another mouse. Goddammit.
I still had those gadgets plugged into the wall, but I guess the varmints had learned to tolerate them. I took solace in telling myself that the beeping still probably kept the rodents out of the walls, and my electrical wiring safe. But what to do now?
I went back to my initial strategy: ignoring them. And this time, it actually kinda worked.
After a couple of weeks, the one mouse I’d been seeing from time to time turned up dead near a heat vent. I’d like to think his little heart gave out after an all night rager of cocaine and prostitutes. Either way.
But of course when you see one mouse, there are others. And sure enough, another turned up. Time for desperate measures.
I got on the internet.
A number of sites were insistent that mice absolutely loath peppermint oil. Yet another reason to admire them, in my opinion, but if it works, it works.
I went around the corner, to a kind of hippie apothecary in my neighborhood called Zensations. Run by a very nice woman named Jen. Friend of a friend. I never have any reason to go in. Now I did.
“What do you need?” was the first thing she said to me. I couldn’t tell if her tone were one of affectionate familiarity or recrimination.
“Peppermint oil.”
“Mice?”
“Yeah.”
Ten bucks for a tiny little bottle. Worth every penny and then some.
I dipped both ends of some Q-tips into the oil and discreetly placed them around the kitchen and living room. Before you knew it the whole house reeked of peppermint. Turns out peppermint’s a real fucker. A friend told me he’d toured the Twinings Tea factory, and they claimed to keep their peppermint in an entirely separate warehouse, lest it overwhelm all the other delicate fragrances that make their various flavors of mediocre tea.
The wiring is uneaten. The droppings are gone. The food is safe. But ya know. I kinda miss the little buggers.