skyring

I got home early this morning. Like about four AM.

Pulled out the computer to check on things before retiring to bed, opened up the web, and heard a small noise behind me.

And a tiny grey sputter of movement when I turned to look.

There, on the bench beside the stove, up out of the reach of the livestock, we keep a baited mousetrap. One of the sort that doesn't kill, merely captures through an ingenious entry portal that prevents small rodents from shimmying back up with their muscular arms.

And a fresh occupant inside, busy trying futile things to escape.

I was too tired to go outside and release it. And it was cold and dark, too. Significant factors in a large number of university students choosing a cab to make the $8.25 trip from the main rank to one of the colleges after midnight.

Instead I went to bed and cuddled the wife, who assumed a defensive posture, guarding her warmth from those who might leech away some heat whilst feigning deep affection. I told her of the mouse, and she said she'd take it out in the morning.

Kerri's idea of releasing mice consists of taking the trap outside and opening it, whereupon the captive scurries off into the hedge, and is later recycled by the cat, who brings it back inside through the cat flap, plays with it awhile before letting it escape into the kitchen.

I begged her not to, this once.

So when I awoke some hours later, I was able to have my breakfast, sternly ignoring the continuing futile attempts from the benchtop, and then take the trap and occupant outside, down the street, across another street and let it go beside a hedge. I figure it's not going to return across a wide stretch of tarmac, and the cat doesn't range that far.

Problem solved.