Oh Rats

You'll never guess what Daddy and Mommy have been doing up late the past couple of nights...

A few weeks ago we started noticing some little brown specks on the floor. Because our children are not the neatest eaters and not always perfectly obedient about only eating in the kitchen, Mommy cleaned them up muttering about how some of the spots were in strange places, but not thinking too much about it. Well, the spots continued and were found in even stranger places. A couple of nights ago it occurred to us that they could be some sort of "droppings" (such a cute name for something so disgusting--let's call it what it is people: poop, feces, etc.).

As Mommy cringed thinking about the disgusting creature that could be creating all of this poop, Daddy said we should leave some of the evidence and call the landlord to ask for an exterminator (Mommy had a serious problem with that--at that time we didn't realize how much we were actually leaving). Late that same night, Daddy heard the culprit come out of hiding and scampering around the living room. Daddy found him and as he looked frantically for something to catch him in, he jumped into the piano. Daddy set up a mousetrap and waited until the wee hours of the morning, but if he made an appearance, it was after poor Daddy had fallen asleep. The following morning Mommy learned about the culprit and was terribly upset. Nothing can make a person feel more like an inadequate housekeeper than knowing a mouse can live well enough to leave billions of little poop spots all over your floor for several weeks.

The landlord's son (the only English speaker in the family) was called and the response was not exactly what we wanted, but we've learned to expect the unexpected when it comes to landlord dealings in Belgium. He said, "Of course, there can be a mouse in the house when you are living in the country". We don't consider our home to be located "in the country" and we realize that mice and other rodents live outdoors everywhere. We've seen Over The Hedge. We also saw mice outside at our homes in Michigan and Texas. The key word is outside. Our landlord's son went on to say that sometimes the mice get "lost" and end up in the house. Oh, so he's just lost. That is a nice way to put it. If he's lost, we have no problem putting up signs giving him directions back outside. We'll even print them in French and Dutch. After all, he is a Belgian mouse. His recommendation was to put out poison. Ummm, did you not notice we have three young children whom we are quite fond of and would like to keep? In all fairness, he did remind us to be careful of the children.

We spent yesterday evening moving every bit of furniture and cleaning up the disgusting droppings. We did not find the mouse even after partially dismantling the piano. That little rodent is good at hiding. So for the second night in a row, we set a mousetrap out behind the piano. The first night he was offered cheese, in which, contrary to shows like Cinderella, he wasn't interested. Last night Daddy place a peanut butter covered cracker out and this morning, Voila! Ratatouille had met his maker. We have one jar of peanut butter that has made the journey from place to place with us for who knows how long. It finally expired in June of this year and for whatever reason Mommy hasn't thrown it out (probably because it is very expensive and difficult to find here--it sits on the shelf under the American sign with tiny, expensive jars of Crisco, Oreo cookies, "Texas Style Beans" and a few other miscellaneous items). We just aren't a peanut butter family, but thank goodness we had it around to help get rid of that nasty little thing.

We decided not to tell the children about our little visitor. We just can't be sure how they will react and we already have one child terrified of imaginary kangaroos in the bedroom windows. We obviously don't feel that this is an issue specific to Belgium. We realize there are mice in America. (This situation reminds me of the song Fievel and his family sang in An American Tale..."There are no cats in America and the streets are paved with cheese!"--we don't think that). But really we could do without having another mouse get "lost" in our house over the next few years. I'm glad he didn't go out and tell his friends (in French of course) "Wow, we hit the jackpot! There are Cheerios, crumbs and sticky spots everywhere, my friends. We can live here indefinitely. And the best part is, the big ones blame the small crumb droppers for our droppings. We've got it made".

Au revoir, Monsieur Souris!