winterbadger | Jun. 16th, 2004

Chris just asked me to come "help with something"; the "something" turned out to be a mouse that Guildenstern had caught, apparently in the basement. I'm still trying to figure out how it got into the basement, since it has no direct openings to the outside. I'm guessing through Red Route One (the walls).

Poor little guy wasn't quite dead. He'd already suffered a wound of some sort, so it seemed like the only kind solution was to kill him quickly (Gildy wanted to keep playing with him, like any good journeyman with a new training tool available), but I seperated him and his prey and finished the little guy off. Then, because he'd done what he's supposed to do, I figured I'd better praise Gildy and tell him he'd been a good hunter.

Selfishly, I'm hoping that this is not the beginning of an influx. There was the one mouse that Rocky and I thought we heard in the wall down here last summer (to whose apparent inability to find his way back out I attributed the later Rather Nasty Smell that seemed to be noticeable for a while). But I don't want to have to deal with regular dispatchings (plus the likelihood that Gildy won't reveal his captures if we keep taking them away, and may try field-stripping the equipment next time...)

He was a cute little guy, with a tiny pink nose, little white whiskers, tiny black beady eyes, and wee paws. I'd much rather he were outside scampering around in the leaves, finding seeds and bits of leaf (and, presumably, taking his chance of getting eaten by a more wild predator) than be inside nibbling our boxes and providing hands-on professional tution for the cats.