When my wife and I woke up this morning, I took my post at the computer to check for new job opportunities and Anna went about her morning tea routine. Not long after I began my job search, though, my wife asked that I clean up the mouse that had died under our kitchen table.
Background
The mice we have in our building are run-of-the-mill, three inch house mice, mus musculus. This past Friday, our landlord actually sprayed for rodents all through the building, but spraying may more may not have any particularly measurable effect.
I was going to say that I can remember each of the three mice that I have killed in our apartment clearly and distinctly, but I realized that they have blended a bit, and I have to concentrate to figure out how each died and in what order. #1 went by mouse trap. #2 trapped itself in the bathroom with me. I closed the door on its hind legs accidentally, and it ran very slowly after that. I caught it in a bag and squashed it with a big glass jar. #3 caught its tail in a mouse trap trying to run away from me and couldn’t get through its hole in the wall with a trap on its tail. I was oblivious to it except that it squealed and scratched at the wall; I had been watching a movie, and came to the kitchen to posit my popcorn bowl. I caught it in a bag and squashed it with a big glass jar.
Monday morning, 12 October 2009
I stared at the dead mouse under my kitchen table for a minute. I crouched down and peered closely at it. The tail was off to its side, so it did not die in its tracks. Its head was between its front paws. It looked like it had accidentally fallen asleep with its eyes open. The assumption from the beginning was that it had eaten poison from our landlord’s work last week.
It was breathing.