A therapeutic drawing of a mouse, by GarrettIf any of you out there have been wondering if perhaps my recent lack of posting was the result of my falling off the face of the earth, you'd be right. I fell off a week ago Saturday, and it was mice in my house that pushed me right over the edge and into my worst nightmare.
The traumatic and horrifying experiences of last week are still too raw for me to want to relive enough to share details here. Suffice it to say that the situation steadily escalated throughout the week: we saw lots of mice, including babies, and their droppings, and those we couldn't see we heard scratch-scratching somewhere inside the oven. All of which of course kept me awake at nights, reduced me to frequent panicked tears, and left me so terrified that I couldn't stand being home. Every day after Garrett got home from school, I'd run away to a friend's house, where my boys and I would spend the rest of the day until Blake could get away from work and rescue us. (Thank you again, a thousand times over, Emily and Jill! I could not have survived last week without you and your kindness!).
So to put it quite mildly, I do not like mice, not one little bit. To me they represent everything that is dark, dirty, and disease-ridden -- everything that I strive so hard not to be -- and they are totally unwelcome in my home. Mice in my house have this terrible way of making everything in my life spiral helplessly out of control.
Our landlord finally got an exterminator over on Thursday morning. He found, treated, and filled lots of entry holes, but, other than gnaw marks and droppings, he found no actual mice or litter-filled nests. Which was wonderful, of course. But he left me wondering how many mice were hiding in the hidden corners of our home who now had no way to leave it? Despite the mouse traps we have strategically set up throughout the house, we haven't actually caught a single one. Which means that the mice hanging around our place are city-savvy and harder than your average mouse to lure into a trap and kill.
But it also appears to mean that we may have scared them out before their ways in were blocked because, happily (and miraculously), we haven't seen any more mice or signs of mice since the exterminator's visit. This has calmed my nerves a tiny bit and allows me to be cautiously optimistic that this whole ordeal might be over.
Even so, I'm still a jumpy, anxious mess, and I've become so paranoid of crumbs that my kitchen actually kind of sparkles now. But our home reeks of baited glue traps, and, judging by the fact that every little creak of this settling, old apartment building makes me jump, I'm still far from again feeling comfortable here. And I can't stand being in my kitchen. Our lease is up at the end of July, and we're seriously considering finding a new place here in the neighborhood to live.
If I could, if it were time, I'd move far, far away from Brooklyn. After all, we've now had mice, so doesn't that mean that our down and dirty New York City experience is complete?
16 comments:
Welcome back, you've been missed.
Oh yuck! I agree with your every sentiment. Mice in my house? No thank you! yuck!!
Oh, so sorry. We did the mice thing, and I still get sick every time I think about it. Yuck. Move. Definitely. (I hear Indiana is nice.) :)
Ugg. I hate mice too. Hopefully you can move?!
Ya, if it were time I'd move too.
Sorry it's been so traumatizing. I totally 100% understand. I've become neurotic because of household pests.
I've been battling lots and lots of ants lately. And while I've been a bit neurotic and extremely stressed over them, they in no way compare to mice! I desperately feel for you! I hope you find a new place soon.
Ugh. Having grown up in farmland Idaho, we saw our share of mice and my citified Mom would FREAK out and wage all out battle on them. Not fun.
I want to know more about the timing of Brooklyn and/or moving out of the city. When will you know that your experience IS complete?
AmyJane -- The timing of our sojourn in Brooklyn is still undecided. Lately, the romance of big city life has all but vanished for me, and my will to stay on is shrinking. It's hard to live here in the way that we do, not to mention exhausting. But even I have to admit that it's just not time yet. If it were up to me, we'd be here for two more years, three max, and then we'd move on. Who knows where to -- just somewhere that is closer to our families and doesn't require that I sacrifice so many basic amenities. Two more years would get Blake to a more solid point in his career, and would also allow for Garrett to continue to receive the therapy we've worked so hard to get him without so high a risk of losing the ground we've gained if we crossed state lines.
Funny you should mention mice since we saw our first one in our yard last week. Although the 3,763 neighborhood cats paw and poo in my veggie gardens, they also keep the mice away. I haven't seen our resident mouse since, and I'm completely okay with that. I hope things get better for you!
We have had a few cockroaches in our house lately, and I have a similiar reaction to them. As does my daughter. She now has me check the bathrooms every morning - just in case. I am a very clean person, we just happen to live in the desert SW where cockroaches are everywhere. It is so gross. I am not sure if I would rather have mice or cockroaches. They are both incredibly undesirable.
Poor you! I'd be a mess, too. Especially with little kids around. Hopefully you don't find any more of them and you can find a place where you're not paranoid about skittering mice in the walls . . . and your oven (eek!!).
Oh goodness. Pet mice aren't all that bad. I had two while growing up. I've also had three pet rats, one that I loved and the other two I wasn't terribly fond of. That being said I'm seriously afraid of wild mice and rats. If I see one, I'll be the first to be on top of a chair screaming. I sure hope your mice problem is over.
I wondered if Garrett's services were a compelling reason to stay. It makes sense on that front, although I can't blame you for being burned out on city life. Just reading about some of your inconveniences makes me cranky and tired!
What does Blake do exactly? Is it a career that can transfer to a more suburban environment eventually?
(I don't mean to pry, if none of this is my business, but I'm curious.)
AmyJane - Blake is an advertising research analyst, a career which most definitely would transfer well, in a variety of ways. He just has one more step on the ladder he'd like to climb and gain some experience in, which would make finding a new job a little easier and more worth doing. Then there's also the matter of convincing him that it's getting to be time to leave the city -- he loves it here a lot more than I do, but then we also are living two completely different NYC lives. If I was living his life, I probably wouldn't be so anxious to leave either. But I'm not.
This is exactly like all my terrors in regards to scorpions. Moving to AZ, that was seriously the hardest thing for me to imagine. Thus far, no run ins, but I'm kind of expecting it. And expecting to react in the same way you did. Hope you get to feel somewhat relaxed soon!
just got caught up on all your new posts...good luck surviving the heat of summer and hopefully those mice won't come back!
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