Tale of a Bungled Mouse KIlling

Most people have heard the phrase, "Oh, he (or she) wouldn't hurt a mouse!" when describing a gentle soul. As of last Sunday, no one can say that about me anymore - if they ever did - because I hurt one.

I didn't mean to. I meant to kill it.

Just about every night for the past year or so mice have gathered under my kitchen sink to socialize and enjoy snacks. And on a number of occasions I have set mouse traps and succeeded in quickly and deftly eliminating a large number of them. I use the old fashioned type of trap that, when it works properly, which it does 99% of the time, instantly snaps their little necks. I feel these are more humane than the sticky traps that glue the mouse's feet to the trap where they languish perhaps for days on end until...ugh, I can't even think about it. It's bad enough when I find a trap several feet away from where I placed it, knowing that the mouse didn't die quite instantly. This happened once when I found signs of mice under the sink the day before our house sitter was coming to stay with the dog while we went on vacation. I set the trap in the morning and left her a note telling her that I had set a trap under the sink and apologized profusely that she would have to dispose of it once it was caught. Several days after we got back I noticed a pungent odor coming from under the sink. I moved aside the assorted household cleaners and there I found the remains of a valiant, albeit, dead, mouse that had survived the trap long enough to drag himself, trap and all, behind the Pine Sol. My sitter probably assumed I'd caught the mouse before I left.

But, extermination must go on. Again, after finding signs of mouse-partying under the sink last weekend I set another trap before going to bed. Next morning when I moved the trash can to see if I had caught one, the trap was gone. I continued moving bottles aside until I spied a small gray rodent peering back at me, quite alive. His tail appeared to be caught in the trap, but the rest of him was fine.

"Oh my God," I hollered to my husband, "it's still alive!"