The Unfortunate Mouseacre

It's official; I'm traumatized. For the past few days, I have been engaged in an ongoing internal battle of ethics.  Do you suppose it is ethical to lay out poisonous traps throughout your garage/laundry/storage facility with every intention of wiping out any and all unsuspecting trespassing rodent species??  I used to believe that it was sadly a necessary part of life.  You have to protect your home from these pesky intruders, right?? Well, after the unfortunate mouseacre that I unknowingly participated in over the past few days, I'm just not so sure.

Perhaps to fully understand the gravity of the situation, I probably ought to go back to the very beginning.

A few days ago, I went downstairs to the garage to do some laundry.  No big deal, just another ordinary day.  Until the moment I dropped a bunched up sock and it rolled behind the washing machine and landed right next to one very dead mouse.

The mouse had hacked up a small puddle of what I assumed to be something formerly internal... And I knew without a shadow of a doubt the cause of death: poison.

I was horrified.  But if that wasn't already bad enough, I glanced to the space next to the air conditioning unit and saw another dead mouse in a very similar state: dead as a doornail.

I shrugged it off after a few hours though, after convincing myself that this was just one more unfortunate aspect of survival on this planet.  Sometimes, you have to take out a few rats to protect what is rightfully yours.

But then, this theory was completely shot to shit yesterday upon revealing another gruesome discovery.  Mommy and Daddy mouse had left behind at least five little baby mice.  I noticed the babies after hearing a constant squeak/cry that persisted for hours upon hours.

They were so tiny.  Their eyes hadn't even opened.

I thought for sure that they had been infected with poison, as the two that were still alive were crying and writhing in a way that surely looked like a pain from their stomachs.  Well I was only partly correct.  The babies were not suffering from poison, but rather from starvation.  Who knows how long they had been sitting there, crying out for their mommy.

Well, basically, I couldn't stand it anymore.  So I decided to scoop them into a dish and put the last two survivors outside... to let nature takes its course.

And when I walked away and left them to the elements, I began to cry.  I know, I know... they are just mice!!! For goodness sake, they will grow up to destroy things and spread diseases...

But I honestly can't help myself.

I felt so bad; in one swoop, we had somehow managed to massacre an entire rodent nuclear family.

And so, after I shed a few tears and pleaded for forgiveness from these helpless infant mice, I made a decision... to be a vegetarian...

I'm sorry, but I'm just not cut out to kill anything that has whiskers, fur and snuggles their siblings... I'm just not up for the job.

So I guess, ultimately, the sacrifice of these mice may have saved one less cow from ending up on the grill.

Oh who am I kidding?? Probably not... 

But at least not for me.  Salad for dinner.

Today:

Madras

1 oz Vodka
Equal Parts Orange Juice 
and Cranberry Juice

On the rocks.