There has been a lot of talk in my life recently about mice. The rodent kind. Not the computer kind. Not only have we some residents in our attic currently but also a friend is having her first tussle with them in her house.

We are rather blase now about them - they are a nuisance and we know how to deal with them - stick down traps and check them every day to re-set them. We caught one just the other night but I am awake more often in the middle of the night than Iain is and I know there are more in the attic just waiting to nibble on the chocolate that we give them as a last meal.

We do have a fairy sensible attitude to them. We are in the country (well, one house away from it anyway) and it is cold out there! They prefer to be warm. But we don’t want them eating the stuff we have up there in storage and really, they aren’t meant to cohabit with humans - so - traps are set.

All this has reminded me of the first time we had mice, in our first house. I remember the first week we had them. I don’t think I slept for that whole week. I was well and truly freaked out the whole time. Mice and their noise and the catching of them were never far from my mind the whole time.

We lay in bed at night listening to them running around in the attic and wondered to ourselves why on earth people say “as quiet as a Church mouse” because we were fairly sure there was a herd of elephants up there. There was nothing quiet about the variety we had. They certainly had never been to Church in their lives.

Anyway, freaked though I was, I couldn’t find it in myself to kill the little darlings. I thought it was horrible. How could you kill them. They were cute.

Huh uh.

I can assure you that by the time you come home from work and find mice droppings on your pillow you no longer think of them as cute. You may have stomach wrenching spasms as you boil wash your bed clothes but you do not think of mice as cute.

By the time they had made it down from the attic to the bathroom, to the bedroom and then to the living room, we knew it was time to do something about them BIG time!

I will never forget how we had traps on either side of the fireplace and kept looking at them every three to five minutes to see if they had been sprung. It wasn’t long before we heard a distinctive SNAP over the sound of the television and looked over to see a dead’un lying there. It was a mixture of happiness that we were starting to win the war and total freak-out-ed-ness that ew there was a dead mouse over there *points and screams.*

We caught a few in traps and Iain disposed of them. As men do. I think we actually put them on the compost heap - you gotta think green huh?

Iain then discovered a fantastic substance called Expanding Foam! I think he had a bit of a fetish about it at one stage. We had it squirted everywhere. He went around the house outside and sealed up every hole you could ever think they could possibly squeeze their little quarter-of-an-inch bodies through. The yellow stuff came out like mousse but then hardened to fill all gaps. We found a massive hole in the boiler house that needed sealed. Obviously the mice were just using that as their private tradesmen’s entrance. The pipes from there would have gone all the way to the bathroom where there were more holes in the skirting board for them to get out into the house. If you have ever watched a house being built you know there are plenty of ways for them to move around inside walls etc. Ever seen The Borrowers?

We had our fair share of humane traps. Before we had the house sealed there was no point in letting them go again as they would just make their way back into the heat. I distinctly remember me having to release one in the back yard, in the general direction of the garden. I literally bent down, opened the trap, jiggled it a little so the darn thing had to leave and danced madly as it turned, looked at the open door and scooted between my feet and ran straight back in to the house. About the only thing it didn’t do was close the door behind itself and stand holding it’s belly laughing at me locked outside.

Never one to let an opportunity pass me by, one day when I was out shopping, I ran into the pet shop, picked up some mouse food, a cage and one of those wheels. I think I even splashed out on a water bottle for it too.

The next mouse I caught in the humane trap was released in the mouse cage. I shut the door and sat back to admire my new *pet.*

My new *pet* didn’t last long. It ran around the cage, climbed the bars and squeezed itself through them and disappeared into the cloakroom to start nesting in there.

I think the second mouse escaped into the cupboard under the stairs.

By the time the third one was caught we had obviously fed them better by then because it couldn’t squeeze through the bars. We kept him and called him Speedy because of the speed at which he could make that wheel turn. If we could only have connected the wheel to the National Grid we would still be using the power from it! So much easier to install than Wind Turbines!

Well Speedy was with us for ages. We kept him on the bay-window-sill. I had him long enough to have to change the bedding quite a few times. Boy he was a smelly creature. We never got on to petting terms with each other. He ran to the opposite end of the cage when ever I made advances.

People came from far and wide to view him. We had to restrict visiting hours because he was becoming fatigued from all the performing he was expected to do for his public. Friends brought THEIR friends with them and no one could quite get into their heads that I had saved all of £2.50 by not buying a mouse in the pet shop. I think they thought it was rather bizarre actually. Not sure about that - but that is the impression I got anyway.

One day I had to take him out to clean his cage. The other mice had all left home by now and he had no one to talk to during the day. I think he was lonely.

I caught him but rather than holding him in my loose fist he wriggled and got his head out. He sank his teeth into the fleshiest part of my index finger and exerted so much pressure and pain I thought I was going to pass out. I lifted my hand and tried to shake him off. He was having none of it. He was holding on and making sure he got his pound of flesh!

I shook and shook and still have the vision of his wee body, attached only by his teeth to my finger, swinging through the air several times before he made a (dizzy) bolt for freedom in the direction of the fireplace.

The fire wasn’t lit but the grate was still warm and he ran in to the pan, danced about like a firewalker and exiting pretty smartish across the hearth, leaving tiny dusty foot prints right across it. He disappeared behind the video stand and wasn’t to be seen for a minute or two.

These adventures always seemed to happen to me when Iain wasn’t around and I knew that if I could just get him back in the cage before Iain came home he wouldn’t need to actually know about the throbbing in my hand and wouldn’t insist on us going to Casualty to have a Rabies shot. . .

I pulled the video stand forward a little and with a torch could just see where he was. I blocked the end off with a video and gathered my resources as best I could. In other words I picked up another video. As he scooted back and forwards I was witness to some fine acrobatics. Never underestimate how high one of these blighters can jump. For some reason I picked up the end video - perhaps it had fallen, I can’t remember why I picked it up but I had it in my hand as Speedy saw light and made for it. Anxious not to let him escape into the rest of the room I dropped the video back into place.

And on to Speedy’s head.

He looked up at me.

He shuddered twice.

He looked at me again.

He said “You keeled me Amigo.”

And Speedy died.

I think we still have the cage in the attic if anyone needs it. . . .

I think that is why Iain prefers traps rather than the humane ones. I think he fears that some day he will come home to another *pet.*

Wangsta teen: Move, nigga, or I'll cut you with my knife!

Tween girl #1: Oh my God! He said the 'n' word!

Tween girl #2: Knife?

I used to work in an office that organised the sale of car registration number plates. We predominately sold Northern Ireland numbers to English customers for various reasons. Some wanted the nice combinations - BIL, FIL, GIL for names, some wanted TXI for taxis, some wanted the fact there is no *year letter* on our plates to disguise the age of their vehicle. This was particularly important to coach companies.

I worked there for seven years before leaving after I had David and didn't want to be away from him so much. The commute killed me every day - especially having to go through the city twice a day.

We had many Northern Ireland people phoning us for valuations for their number plates. Some were only worth £75 some were worth loads. We had one persistent guy who I couldn't get rid of, I told him the number was only worth a few pounds but he was insistent it was the best thing ever. I eventually passed him to the boss who patiently explained to him that the best chance of selling a plate was if it had letters in it that were common name letters - like SIJ and the Fermanagh IL suffixes. . .

The guy was adamant that UIA plate his was a seller but the boss said "I'm sorry, but we just don't get many people asking for UIA plates willing to pay more than I have quoted you - there just aren't many names beginning with U."

Quick as a flash the guy answered "What about EUGENE?"

Bless. . . I am not sure he ever figured out why the boss choked with laughter and excused himself. . . .

Tonight my brother made an entry in his LiveJournal for the first time in, I suppose, eighteen months. It filled us in with what has happened to him in that time in just a few short paragraphs. From the London bombings, getting married, to the service for the babies he and his wife lost. It has been an eventful year for him.

I got to looking at my LiveJournal habits while I was there. This evening I posted three replies to other peoples' journals and I realised that although I still look at my "friend's page" every day, my life is now more taken up with RSS than LJ. I hardly ever post any replies and the last time I posted there myself was in July.

(My brother announced his intention to blog by asking me for a link to my blog. I quizzed him as to which one and he said "Green is not the only colour." That made me smile. It is true. Green is NOT the only colour. Neither is it the title of my LJ blog but I will keep it in mind for the future! It took me quite a moment to think what the name of it IS though!)

I suddenly realised that I have a paid account there. I am paying for it to sit and do nothing all day! I need to make sure that doesn't renew - oops - looks like I DID renew it in February! I remember thinking that I couldn't do without the paid account back then. I needed the extra features it gave me. Like. Umm. Well, there's umm. Well it was a good idea at the time! I used 52 of my 100 User pics! Nods. That is a thing I miss here. I liked picking my user pic depending on what I was talking about. I suppose I carried that over to here a little bit with the pictures I try to put in each time. I also needed the photo hosting to a certain degree. Somewhere I could put photos that wasn't quite a public as Flickr. Oh Oh Oh Oh! they gave me 7 extra user pics for being a loyal customer and it took me 6 months to notice! Ooops!

It was through LJ that I started to learn a little of what I know now. It was definitely where I cut my teeth in the world of online-blogginess. It seems a long time ago now. I still feel I am only on step 3 of um, 100!

If it wasn't for LJ . . .

While I was looking around the "new look LJ" a song came on iTunes and instantly my eyes filled with tears. It is one of the first songs I added to iTunes when that was first introduced to me back in LJ days and for some reason always has that effect on me. Isn't it funny how music reminds you of a certain era?

Ahh. Nostalgia just isn't what it used to be you know. . .

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I sat for a while this evening adding a few entries from my old LiveJournal account to the archives on here. I was already up to February 2005 and managed to add most of March 2005. (Sorry if you have the RSS feed and received 20 odd entries in one go!)

This isn't as easy as it sounds as it means I have to sit and read the entries to see if they are worthy of being added here. This takes time and I am easily distracted at the moment. Especially when both Jessica and David were in the same room as me and fighting over a novelty pillow (never buy just one pillow. . . ) and a Sky remote control. Jessica still isn't well but that hasn't affected her screaming abilities.

It would seem that March 2005 I was at my most witty and just about to become a geek. I was also an "at-home-at-least-part-time" Mum. Jessica was in P1 and left school very early every day. I had only a limited amount of time to cram Me things into during the morning and it looks like I filled that time as best I could. My brother came to visit with his daughter and I wrote lovely things about him. There are entries for most days and several entries for some days!

How dedicated I was then. How full of rants I was. How many stories I had in me to come out. . . The quick look back in time hasn't done me any harm - I had forgotten how funny some of my stuff was.

Must strive to become that funny again!

I did a quick search a few moments ago on "November 3rd". (Giving you all fair warning this year so you all remember - this may be the last birthday I wish to acknowledge for some time to come.)

Imagine my absolute delight and happiness when (according to the link) I found that Lucy Maud Montgomery was born on the same day as me.

LM Montgomery wrote Anne of Green Gables and the other books in the series about Anne Shirley and her childhood in Prince Edward Island (wherever that was).

I read them all as a young girl and devoured them one after another. I think this was the fist time my obsessive "must have everything in the group / series all at the same time - or else" attitude to life showed itself. I lost interest when she started having too many babies I think - I was only young and more interested in her childhood than all that soppy romance stuff.

I remember all the scrapes she found herself in, recognising her need for a "kindred spirit" in her best friend Diana and finding myself in floods of tears when Matthew dies (sorry for the spoiler!). Up until then I never knew books could move you enough to cry. Up until then I had been reading The Famous Five and Secret Seven!

Green Gables was, by far, my favourite childhood book. It is one of the few books I ever read more than once.

It never ceases to amaze me how limited my concentration on certain points is. I had no idea where Prince Edward Island was but it wouldn't have occurred to me that I ought to find out. I probably thought it was a made up place.

I absolutely LOVED that book and watched the film adaptation and film when I was older. I must actually go down the street and buy myself another copy. . . .

Meanwhile. imagine my absolute disappointment when I read further in to the biography of Lucy Maud and found that actually she was born on November the THIRTIETH not the THIRD - must be a typo! But what an advantageous typo - I haven't read a book in ages and this might be a way to get back into reading!

As I was typing this and thinking that I must have been about David's age when I read Green Gables I asked him what he has read lately. He is still reading Calvin and Hobbes at night - there is always a book by his bed - but not book books. . .

I asked him "Have you not read a novel yet?"

He looked blankly at me.

"You know what a novel is?"

"Yes of course I do, it is a book with more than a hundred pages and absolutely no drawings in it."

Well . . . . . technically I suppose. . . .

I'll lend him Green Gables when I am finished with it.

I had to phone Apple a while back and received an email today asking me to participate in a survey about the care I received. As you do from time to time.

But.

It would seem I am now in the age bracket of 35 to 49. What? What? But that is sooooo broad and soooooo unfair. It was bad enough when I left the 29 to 34 bracket. It was bad enough when I entered the 35 to 40 bracket. But for crying out loud - you have just wished a very large portion of my life expectancy away in one huge leap there. DUDE!

I bet it was a fecking 24 year old that devised the questionnaire. "Mmmm - everyone over the age of 35 to 49 are old so clump THEM together. . . . everyone over 49 is nearly pensioner so clump THEM together. . . Let's just keep the 18 to 25s here and stick the 26 to 34 over there. . . Oh god I am so glad I will never be as old as THEY are. . . "

And by the way! YEA! Just while we are on the age thing. . . Not that I am at all touchy about it all. . .

IF YOU SAID RECENTLY:

There was no such thing as MSN, video games or the internet: if a kid was looking for entertainment beyond reading or imaginative play, they had to occupy themselves with a poor black-and-white TV set (usually in the 'best' but freezing front lounge) and it's four crap channels - and that was only if your parents were posh enough to have a spare television set.

I'll have you know that you didn't know you were born - FOUR TV CHANNELS??? FOUR??? I REMEMBER WHEN THERE WERE TWO! That was BBC1 and BBC2. Officially there were three eventually but ITV was so often on strike that they went for months where there was nothing on there and we had to watch 1 and 2 all the time and everyone knows there was nothing on 2 except Open University programs!

AND! AND! The tv was miles away at the far end of the room and there were no fecking remote controls in those days and who had to set out on a major expedition to turn the channel over every time? ME! That's who! ME! Those were the days you turned the television on in the evening and stayed on the same channel until Close. That would be the Close that went EEEEEEEEEEeeeeEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeEEEEEEEEEEE in your ear-hole so you had to waken up and go turn the telly off before going to bed. Oooops - did you just sleep through The Queen AGAIN?

Four channels! T'uh! Young'uns these days. T'uh! Don't know they are born I tell you. T'uh! I remember when Channel Four started. I remember the VERY day it started. (It was the day before my birthday!) I can tell you where I was sitting and the room I was in and the house I was in the very first time Channel Four started. It had no adverts in the beginning - just hours of that music going on over and over and over and over. . . . and the clever logo of the number four in different colours all spiralling around the screen and coming together at the last moment to make up a four again. . . and the music going on and on and on and on - until eventually they got some advertising in place. . . . and finally the music stopped. I kinda miss the music now. . .

Did I ever tell you about the coin operated tv we had when I was 4?. . . . Remind me to tell you about the time I let the thieves in and they stole our tv while my Mum was visiting next door. . . That'll learn her huh? Shouldn't have left me on my own! . . . . .
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Poor Jessica - we were getting ready to pick David up from school and I ran down the stairs to get her shoes from under the stairs. I had made it half way up the hall when I heard a bad banging noise from the stairs. My little pet was bouncing down them head first. Wee woman! Awww. She landed on her head and screamed for five minutes solid. What can you do but sit there with her on your knee hugging her. There is no point in talking - she wouldn't hear you over the din of her wailing!

There ought to be a law against stairs. Surely they couldn't be legal? You ought not to be allowed to live in a house with stairs until your children are eighteen or older. I may write to my MP about this very matter. Five years old is far too young to be in possession of such terrible equipment.

David still remembers the time he fell down the stairs at our old house. I think he must have been no older than three. I don't think he remembers our old house but he remembers the fall! Again, I went down them first with him following. I was in a hurry to answer the door to Aunty Lesley and he came tumbling down after me.

Every now and then he will talk about the time "he fell down the stairs the time Aunty Lesley was at the door". Isn't it funny how we have memories of things.( He just came home from Big Jordan's house and I asked him "do you remember the time you fell down the stairs?" he said - "YEA - in our old house - the time Aunty Lesley was there?" SEE??? He SO does remember!)

I remember falling down a spiral stair case - am fairly sure my brother was not born so I was around three too.  I don't remember whose house we were at but I remember falling.

Hateful things  - spiral staircases. Hate them with a passion now. 


I think we need to look for a bungalow.