Dinner for two?

It's been fairly dull here at Casa di Calamity just lately and although this blog is called Medication Time I am leery of turning into a medical bore and I'm having trouble keeping to my resolution to write more often without resorting to writing about my health issues. So when I read Rachel's account of the demise of an unwelcome house guest I was reminded of something that happened a few years ago in the company of my dearly departed old moggies Wuggy and Pud'n.



Wuggy aka Mr Puff and Pud'n aka Fifi Pud'n-tops (c'mon, everyone gives their pets daft pet names in addition to daft proper names ... don't they?) brother and sister, died within 6 months of each other aged 16 about 5 years ago now. Wuggy had cancer in his mouth and Pud'n developed kidney, thyroid & liver failure after having her teeth cleaned under general anaesthetic.

They were a special pair of cats, very loving and became my surrogate children after Henry died so I was devastated when their time came to an end. Unlike the 2 we have now they weren't a huge threat to the local wildlife. Pud'n liked occasionally to catch a baby rabbit and chew its hind legs off in the cloakroom and Wuggy was a great believer in catch & release. More than once we would have to chase his guests around the hall. Once we were plagued by the most revolting smell that got worse day by day - it turned out to be dead mousie gently mouldering under the washing machine. Bless.

One day I discovered one of our padded placemats was frayed and shedding its stuffing. I thought it must have got stuck in the drawer and ripped at some point. Then I started noticing tiny brown lumps on the worktops in the kitchen. At first I thought it was coffee granules, I thought maybe my Dad had spilled some when he was housesitting one day. Now in my defence I'm not a coffee drinker but all the same you might want to ask for tea if you ever come round for a cuppa because those brown lumps turned out to be mouse shit.

The thing that really gave the game away was when I pulled a brand new packet of Digestives out of the larder cupboard and discovered a very neat hole that went right through the packaging and the biscuits - it was like someone had taken an ice cream scoop and carved out the biscuits.

Imagine the scene back at Mouseville. Mrs Mouse meets her mate at door

"Now then Murgatroyd, hasta had a good day at t'biscuit mine?"

"Ee bah gum lass, ah've had a grand day but that seam o' Digestives collapsed today"

"By 'eckerslike, it didn't!?"

"Aye, lass, almost crushed me under all that wholesome goodness and dunkability. Ah'll 'ave to move on to t'chocolate Hobnobs afore long"

The kitchen was scrubbed inside and out and several mouse traps were purchased, baited with chocolate and generally ignored by the mouse population. We assumed Murgatroyd must have moved out because we didn't find any more evidence of him for several days.

One evening Pud'n was sitting in front of the gas fire in the living room. It wasn't lit so she wasn't sitting there for warmth but she certainly seemed interested in it for some reason. She wouldn't budge so Capt Scarlet decided to have a look at what she was so taken with. With a torch he spied a pair of beady black eyes staring back at him.

"A mouse!" he cried and proceeded to dismantle the fire. This of course prompted the mouse to scurry away and hide while the Capt poked the void behind the fire with whatever he had to hand. Pud'n lost interest and left the room.

The mouse snuck out of a gap and scarpered for a corner while I tried to catch him. He managed to do an entire circuit of the room with us pouncing and moving furniture but to no avail. He made it back to the gas fire. We went out for a KFC.

When we brought the food back we plonked ourselves in front of the TV to eat and after a while Murgatroyd crept out from his hidey hole and started nibbling something on the carpet. When we moved he scurried back to safety.

We started eating again, he crept out of his hole and started eating too. I went over to see what he had found and it turned out to be some kernels of sweetcorn (OK I am officially the world's worst housekeeper - I couldn't remember the last time we ate sweetcorn). I went into the kitchen and dug out a huge plastic salad bowl, crept back into the room and made myself as inconspicuous as possible. Sure enough, Murgatroyd crept out from his lair again and I plopped the salad bowl down over him. My patented humane spider catching technique apparently works on small mammals too!

At this point the cats wandered back in the room to see if there were any hot wings left and they couldn't believe their eyes when they saw little Murgatroyd sitting in his plastic Thunderdome calmly munching bits of sweetcorn and being incontinent in a way that only mice seem to be able to. We let them study him for a couple of minutes while we took photos and had a good giggle and then I slid an old calendar under the bowl and took him outside to release him. A mouse tale with a happy ending!



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