Where there's poop there's...

Yep, mice. I received a knock on my door the other day and found my neighbor (no, not the freaky nail lady, but a super-nice mom of two young kids, who we'll dub NN for Normal Neighbor) standing outside my door. I used the peep-hole this time and shushed H prior to opening the door, lest my other neighbor have a snagged toe-nail or something. NN said that she was sorry for just dropping by, but wanted to let me know that they had a 'mice problem', and she just wanted to let me know since we share a common wall.

I couldn't help the look of horror that crossed my face, because there is nothing I dislike more than rodents. I tried to think back to my kitchen and if I'd seen any 'signs' of mice, as she said that she'd had pest control out and they patched a hole, but she still had poo on her counters and in the laundry area this morning...double gross. I couldn't think of anything, but you can bet that as soon as I closed the door, I'd found the motivation I needed to deep clean the ole-kitchen.

There's nothing quite as entertaining as a hugely pregnant woman wielding the vacuum hose and gathering the fuzz and dust from around the dryer, refridgerator and under the stove, then on hands and knees using pine sol to clean the floors. I then flew like a maniac from counter to counter with my new 'earth friendly' orange kleen ensuring there were no errant crumbs, and that all food containers were appropriately sealed. After a final perusing of all cupboards and ensuring myself that there were no droppings to be seen and that all appliance fittings seemed secure to the wall, I sat my sweaty self down and finished "Happy Feet" with H, who'd abandoned the movie in order to stand at the entry to the kitchen asking in his Eliza Doolittle lilt "Wha' are you doooooing?"

Once summer during college, I moved my stuff back to my parents house and unwittingly brought a little hitch-hiker with me. When I was getting ready for work and saw him (or her, I didn't get close enough to see) in the doorway to the bathroom, I left the house in whatever state of readiness I was, and called my dad from the road, notifying him that they had a mouse in their house, and that I hoped it would be trapped by the time I got home.

My mom called me at work to let me know that not only had the mouse been trapped, but she had done her own little OCD cleaning of the house, to find that the center of that little mouse's world had also been the center of mine. Yes, she had found mouse poop in my bed under my pillow! I knew that my room was messy, but didn't think that it was literally a rat's nest (okay, smarty, I know that mice and rats are different, but mice nest is not as catchy).

After two nights of dreams filled with mouse poo, I've eased into the kitchen each morning, flipped on the lights and scanned the nooks and crannies. We're in the clear so far, but lets just hope that the inhumane poison and whatever else they used works. Yes, my name is SallyHP and I'm a heartless beyotch.