The City Girl and the Farm Boy

John and I hosted some interesting house guests recently.
We didn't have to entertain them. They arrived without luggage and I didn't have to lay out fancy soap in the guest bathroom.
But they overstayed their welcome and invited all their relatives.
I don't deal well with critters that have more legs and hair than I do.
Mice and spiders make my skin crawl.
I suspected we were running a Rodent Bed and Breakfast after I discovered one had been living quite comfortably in a 30-pound bag of dog food in the garage. Not much good can come from a canine breakfast served with a side of dead mouse.
I'm not sure what caused its demise -- but it doesn't say much for the nutritional value of fat-dog dog food. Maybe it was smashed by the weight of said food. Either way, it wouldn't be spreading the word about good eats at our house.
Admitting you have a rodent issues is like confessing the crazy relative you keep locked in the attic is on the loose. And you can't hide what's going on when you shop where people know you.
A large bag of grapes and a four-pack of mouse traps through the checkstand and you have no secrets.
I was raised a city girl. Wooden mouse traps are a little out of my range. No matter, I managed to set the trap without losing a finger, leaving a generous cube of cheese as bait. I moved onto peanut butter when the cheese kept disappearing leaving the trap unsprung.
I live with two men convinced I have no survival skills. I know they set me up just for the laughs. They snickered while I spooned peanut butter under the cheese scented pad, but never told me I was doing it wrong.
John finally decided to bail me out. He could only take my manic cleaning and sniveling for so long.
He went to the feed store, where we don't know anybody, and brought home a metal box trap.
"This is more humane," he said, dropping peanut butter into a corner of the box. "The mouse gets in but can't get out. Then, we'll take him to the field at the end of the street and let him go."
"Won't it come back?" I asked.
"Annie, mice aren't that smart," exasperation showing all over his face.
For several days, we moved that box trap from one part of the family room to another.
I was getting frantic. I smelled like bleach 24/7 and was quickly becoming a candidate for an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Intervention.
John told me to be patient. He spent his childhood summers on his family's farm in Deer Island. He was manly and knew how to deal with this.
Until the day Pixie and Dixie's brazen relative walked right past the trap in broad daylight. It didn't actually walk. It ran -- within an inch of Joey's nose. He didn't even flinch.
John bought another box trap. Guess he figured if one piece of equipment didn't work, he needed two.
I was less than trusting, so I doubled my own efforts. I redeployed newly baited wooden traps in every room near ground zero. The place was a mine field. The smell of peanut butter was overwhelming.
The next day, one of my traps was upside down in the bathroom, a skinny unmoving tail sticking out into the hall.
City Girl, 1. Farm Boy, 0.