Bikerbetty's (almost) back!

I'm so excited I can hardly type!

Yesterday's x-rays were good. Today I did cast off the moonboot and walk, and yea verily it did hurt a bit. Poo. The foot hath forgotten how to walk.

What was painful at 4pm, though, was no longer painful at 9pm. Watering the garden worked miracles. As did a minor mouse-project next door.

God it's nice to have good neighbours! Poor Maree has been terrorised by a mouse recently, and I've been offering to remove any meeces - but she has consistently declined (probably due to my crippled state. I bet she was worried that I couldn't outrun a mouse and I might drop dead from fright... LOL)

Tonight, though, back on two legs and only needing marginal support from a crutch, I went mouse-hunting at Maree's (she would do the same for me if the situation were reversed, with spiders instead of mice).

NO LUCK!

We could see where the mouse had been (how much POO can a single mouse produce in the course of an evening's frolics in a bag of dessicated coconut, for goodness' sake?) but there was no mouse. We re-laid baits in more "mouse-friendly" locations and I made Maree promise to call me if mousie should show his face again. I even offered the services of Oscar bin Laden, who sat at her front door yowling mournfully. Was he begging me to come home and give him some attention, or was he yowling death-threats at Maree's meeces? Who knows! He even did a cursory stalk through the house, with much sniffing and waving of the tail, (who knows what cats think?) before shepherding me home. That cat is SUCH a control-freak.

Actually, Oscar bin Laden despatched a mouse the night before last. He left the corpse by my bed (a love token, bless his little black heart!) Perhaps it was Maree's mouse, who knows?

Oh - but I am distracted by talk of vermin...

MY FOOT IS ALLEGEDLY BETTER! I've an appointment with a physio next Tuesday after work. I hope to learn how to make my foot do what it has been doing for the last 49 years without any trouble - and I hope to learn it quickly! I have a motorcycle that has been sitting patiently (and sadly, I'm sure) in the shed. We need to RIDE!

Of Mice and Me

It's just as well mice don't freak me out the way big spiders do. There was another nocturnal adventure at my place yesterday.

It's not the first time Oscar bin Laden has tried gifting me with a mouse. I'm no stranger to teeny weeny mouse corpses, but I prefer not to be a witness to the corpse-making process.

A few months ago Oscar was dancing about on my bed at around 2.30am. He was insistently plucking at a throw rug that I'd put on top of my doona for extra warmth. The constant poke, poke, poke suddenly triggered a response in my sleeping brain - and I became very awake very quickly, and gingerly lifted a corner of the throw rug just in time to see a long mousy tail wriggle closer to me. Oscar saw it too, and prepared to deliver the death blow. Yuk - not on my bed you don't, you mouse-murdering little bastard!

2.30am in a Canberra winter is no time to be wandering the back yard in your jammies, looking for a safe spot to liberate a traumatised mouse, but that's what I found myself doing. Mouse, 1 - Cats, 0. Betty Mouse-Friend - frozen but metaphorically warm & fuzzy.

So anyway, last night's mouse, which had eluded both Oscar and Miff during the 2am mouse-chasing fiesta, was nowhere to be seen this morning. I was sort of glad - the tiny little corpses always make me feel a bit sad.

Mice aren't very bright, I discovered. When I saw that my slipper had an inhabitant, and picked it up to take it to freedom, stupid Mousie leapt out, into the waiting jaws of Oscar bin Laden. My God, the GUILT! I had delivered him to his doom! I would be responsible for an innocent (but stupid) mouse's tortured demise. NOOOooooooooo!

Mayhem ensued. Oscar kept catching Mousie, releasing him and batting him across the floor. Mousie would recover and run, which Oscar found very exciting. Miffy joined in, and suddenly two fanged Furies (or Furries, if you prefer) were having great fun playing mouse-tennis.

Ernest(ine) the giant spider watched the proceedings from her new corner, high above the front door, while I ran around the house with a plastic takeaway container to catch Mousie if I got the chance. It was exhausting.

Mousie ran beneath a wrinkle in a rug, and cowered there, catching its breath. The cats took turns poking their arms under the rug, right up to the elbows (do cats have elbows?) with no luck.

Oscar ran out of patience and did something I've never seen him do before (sometimes that cat is scary). He leapt upon a corner of the rug, and in a brilliant display of fancy footwork and sleight of paw, flung the rug back to reveal the unmoving mouse.

I pounced with my takeaway container. My moment had come; my chance to be a hero and to redeem myself. I hoped I was in time...

Mousie was released into the wild (yes, my grass is growing back at an amazing rate) and what passes for normal life in Chez Betty resumed. Betty Mouse-Friend, smug but weary, gave Ernest(ine) the Giant Spider a friendly wave, and shuffled wearily back to bed for a much needed rest.

I must empty the kitchen dresser and move it - I am almost certain that's where the mice are getting in. I like an adventure as much as the next person, but mouse-murders at midnight aren't my idea of fun.