Leaves the Fallen Rotting

City mouse.  Country mouse.  Mice are annoying in any house.  I have a mouse.  I don’t know just what he’s up to.  I’ve met him.  He’s not very impressive.  Fairly rendered he’s more like a mouse-ette.  The night before last he was scratching away at a place that sounds like it is up beneath the dishwasher.  What the hell are you doing in there? I opened the dishwasher.  I opened the neighboring cabinets to the left and to the right.  And when I went back to my chair to read he figured it was OK to resume scratching.  So, I’d return to the kitchen and he’d pause.  I’d leave, he’d resume.   And then I figured I could do my work, sitting on a chair in the kitchen itself.  He remained paused for quite a while.  Then, suddenly, for no apparent reason, he decided to leap out in front of me with a squeak and dart before me across and under the refrigerator.  Did I mention, he is especially unimpressive?

This morning, up early, everyone deeply retired into sleep, he resumes his scratching.  I start the same routine.  But to be fair, I don’t really want to read on a stool in the kitchen.  But in the comfy chair, with the scratching resumed, I consider my options:  Ignore him.  Move further away so I can’t hear him.  Go to battle against him.  I consider the various mice-removal techniques.  Glue traps should be banned by United Nations High Commission, as unconscionably cruel.  Snap traps are quick, but also rather wretched.  Poison leaves the fallen rotting in your wall somewhere.  But this scratching has certainly got to stop.

I read through more of the Old Testament this morning than I think I have ever managed before.  I finished Exodus and just kept on going through Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy.  All I can say is I hope I wind up on a talk show some day with a guy named Ron.  I’ll say to the host, apropos of nothing:  Well, sure.  I mean give unto the Lord what’s due unto the Lord.  And to me and Ron, gives what’s due-to-Ron-and-me. 

A few interesting tidbits, such as the fact that Moses is an Egyptian word:  Like Thutmose, meaning comes-from-the-water.  I confess, I hadn’t realized what “Pass-over” really meant.  Rather hard reckoning by the Lord for every single, solitary Egyptian family to suffer a loss.  One gets the sense of just how remarkably predominant Egypt was in nearly everything.  And I imagined Ramses II as the Pharaoh of Exodus who never seems to learn, though it isn’t necessarily clear it was he any more than any other Pharaoh. 

I bought a pumpkin today.  No one is likely to make their way down this driveway to trick or treat here this year.  I think I’ll be in China then anyway.  But it could be cool for my daughter's friend to see this odd tradition.  I’ve been summoned.  Let’s carve a jack-O-lantern.  OK then.  That we will.

Saturday, 10/12/19