Pestilence, Part III

Saturday dawned grey and cold. I struggled out of my blanket cocoon and into a world where the heat was not on. Stupid conservation. Why can't we heat unused rooms just a little bit?

I had to work, so I took a blistering shower and headed out. Priority one was finding someone from Maintenance who could direct me to the nearest fully-functioning sonic rodent deterrent thingy. And on my way to the coffee machine I saw Maintenance Guy Larry. God bless coffee and God bless Larry, the day sure was looking up.

Except Larry told me they were out of sonic thingys. And the coffee was subpar, but it's always subpar in the dining hall, so my disappointment there was only nominal.

All of this translated to me having to wait another day to get my hands on a sonic-savior, thus another night at the staff house. Nothing like supervising people AND being their roommate. At least I was going to figure out the thermostat for my second night.

At the end of the workday, I knew I needed to go back into the Mouse House and gather clean clothes for another day of exile. I recruited Hali. Good, brave, funny Hali. So we cautiously opened the door and when no phalanx of mice assaulted us, stepped inside. I walked purposefully toward my bedroom in time to hear Hali ask "eww, what are these? Ants?"

And yes, they were ants. Dead ants. Black and shriveled and laying scattered across my living room floor. A significant number of them, too.

Why?

I honestly don't know. Until a couple of days ago, I would've said I didn't have a mouse problem either. So clearly I'm not the one to ask.

So past the dead ant mine-field and into my room for clean cloths. Again, I chose the first ones I could coordinate, swiped some clean underwear from the drawer and headed to the (now dreaded) bathroom for a few things I'd abandoned in my original exodus.

And there it was. Floating. Dead. In the toilet.

And in the toilet was where I left it because I didn't know what to do with it. Flush it? What if it got stuck in there? Scoop it? What if it was smelly and bloaty and toilet water its tail touched me? Uh uh. It wanted the toilet and the toilet it shall get (until I can get someone to help me.)

One more trip across the ant cemetery and the passage of time in the Rodent Green Zone brought Sunday around which in turn, brought me into town where I visited several hardware stores. In the third one they had one last package of the sonic-saviors I'd been seeking (whew, alliteration!) and I unhesitatingly purchased them for $27 on my work credit card.

Take that, mice.

Take that, Maintenance Department Budget.

So homeward I went. I threw all my new groceries into the fridge (yes, even the cheerios and my new face lotion) and plugged in my new anti-mouse devices. They each cover a single room of 500 square feet or less and since my cabin is comprised of four rooms and is a whopping 550 square feet (total) I went ahead and used all 4 devices, just to be extra super duper sure.

(Look at those mice run!)

Passing the toilet tomb and springing blithely over the ant corpses, I left for one last night in the staff house, secure in the knowledge that I had the upper hand (over at least 1/2 my pest problems.)

Now tonight, Monday, I'm back for the first time in three days. I still feel like everything has been crept and crawled over, pawed, nibbled, sniffed and sampled, and this disgusts me more than I care to admit, but what can I do?

After posting this, I shall cozy up to my old friend BLEACH and begin the task of reclaiming my domain. Not how I wanted to spend my Monday night, but perhaps its for the best. I will crank up the good tunes, don my yellow June Cleaver rubber gloves and dance around the house in my oldest sweats, banishing the last traces of the pestilence that banished me over the weekend.

I just hope I can sleep tonight...and that I can use my toilet without any post-traumatic stress flashbacks. I'll keep you posted.