Eeeeeeeeeek!

A few weeks ago, when I was in Kentucky, I talked to Peter on the phone and he said, "I think I hear an animal in our bedroom wall."

It's not that I didn't believe him, but Peter's ears suffered through years of playing in extremely loud clubs and rock concerts without earplugs. So yes, I believed that he heard something, but I wasn't really convinced that it was an animal.

About a week later, we were in our bedroom and he said, "That! Do you HEAR that?"

I did hear a little something, but it was very faint and I'm not even sure if I trusted my ears. But then the next morning when I woke up, I distinctly heard something that sounded like chewing in the wall.

I googled "animal in wall" and came across websites featuring birds and possums and raccoons caught in between the walls.

An hour later, I was blithely getting a Swiffer cloth to Swiffer around the living room floor. I pressed down on the box to lift up the flap and AMOUSERANOVERMYHAND!!!! Oops, sorry. I meant: A...MOUSE...RAN...ACROSS...MY...HAND.

Just at that moment, Peter turned the doorknob as he returned from work and heard my bloodcurdling scream that sounded a bit like: "UUUUUUUUUUAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
(deepbreath) AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUEEEEEEEEE (deepbreath) EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"

He said that at first, my frenzied, high-pitched scream made him think that I had hurt myself, but then my scream took on a frantic energy that made him think, "Oh, yeah. That noise I've been hearing is probably a mouse!"

Apparently, the mouse had been FEASTING on the bird seed that we keep under the sink--which is also where we keep our cleaning supplies.

That night we went to Home Depot and picked up these plastic kill and contain mousetraps because they didn't have what my friend who lives in Park Slope calls the "Mouse Electric Chair."

It looked pretty flimsy, but it caught the mouse a few days later. At least, I hope it was that mouse and I hope that it was the only mouse in the house.

Although, Peter and I keep wondering, how was is that the mouse was in the Swiffer box the moment I reached for it? Was he sleeping in there like Stuart Little?