Back at the vet with Froud. Her face cancer is back and now she’s gotta go in every day this week for fluids. And I’ve gotta pay for it, which makes my stomach hurt a little. Not as bad as her face hurts, probably. Also, I wrote a Pacific Rim fic for the other day.

Last night I had seen something move across the living room floor out of the corner of my eye. I figured it was a spider trying to get to cover before a cat saw it. But this morning in the kitchen, I saw it again. It is not a large spider. It is a tiny little mouse. These are the words I heard myself saying as we stared at each other:

Me: "Oh no. Oh nonono. You can't be here. You can't! You don't know what will happen! You don't know what they'll DO!"

I looked around to make sure the cats hadn't heard me and continued.

Also me: "The black and white one looks like an elderly duchess with one too many valium, but she will eat your head! EAT. Your HEAD. And leave the body for me to clean up and/or step on with my bare feet in the dark! Sob! It's happened before! And, and the stripy one? Oh man! He's like Jack Torrance and Norman Bates and Sweeney Todd all in one! It won't be quick. It will last the rest of your life. You have to go. Get out of here. Save yourself, mousie. You have to run! Run for your life!"

And then the mouse ran under the dishwasher and I went to work with the knowledge that I had done all I could. I haven't seen any little battered or headless bodies since I got home, so maybe he took my advice.

You know those Schticky rolly things they sell on tv? I got one at Walmart awhile back and it works great. I have cats and with cats you will have shed hair, clawed cardboard from their scratcher, scattered kibble, and today, the clipped off barbs off fish hooks. It's great for getting up those.

I live in an old house, and one of the previous owners left a weird tangle of wire and three-pronged fish hooks hanging on a hook in the back room of the basement. I don't fish, especially for anything I need a three-pronged hook for, and I really didn't have a better place for it, so I just left it there. That was two years ago.

I usually keep the back room in the basement closed, because it's the back room in the basement and that's where anything creepy will manifest if it happens. It got damp in there over the winter though and was smelling musty, so around Christmas time, I left the door open to let it air out. So, about three months ago.

Today, I was getting a load of laundry when I heard a crash and a commotion from the basement. You never want to hear a commotion from the basement when you live alone in an old house and you know the back room of the basement has been left open. But, then I heard this soft yowling and I relaxed. The crazy cat was up to something. So I got the rest of the laundry and started down. The yowling got louder and more frantic and it was coming from the dark recesses of the back room in the basement.

I was there with a laundry basket on my hip thinking, ok, this is how the creepy thing gets me. I go into the dark to find my kitty and instead there is something horrible imitating his meows to lure me in to the back room from which I will never emerge again. But I went anyway. He's my baby. I raised him on an eyedropper when I found him and sisters in a box on the side of the road. And I had a whole basket of dirty clothes to protect me.

I venture in, turn on the light, and look around. I can't see him, but I can hear him. It's a small room so there's only so many places he could be. And then I see him, hanging onto the back wall, trying to clamber up because somehow he is dangling from the fishhook wire and one of those three-pronged hooks is right through his face. I probably screamed, but I don't remember.

So I grabbed him and lifted him to keep the strain off and he got himself all tangled in wire. I got him upstairs and ruined a pair of shears cutting through the wire so that it was only one hook we had to deal with. I knew I didn't have anything that would cut through the fish hook, so I scampered across to my neighbor's house to ask to borrow some wire cutters. He lent me some and I wrapped the cat in a blanket to keep from getting clawed, pinned him down, pushed the hook through until I could reach the barb, clipped it off in two tries, and then pulled the whole hook off. Phew.

Then, I held him down again for some hydrogen peroxide. I'll call the vet on Monday to see what else I need to do. Do cats get tetanus? I don't even know.

But! that still left me with a patch of floor covered in hair, claw marks, and the clipped off barbs of fishhooks. With the Schticky, I was able to roll them all up and then check to be sure I had them all so I wouldn't find them by accident one barefoot day. They were all there so I picked them off and threw them away, and rinsed off the Schticky so it would be ready for another adventure. Seriously, that thing works great. I wonder if they make wire cutters.

Long story short: Cat. Fish hooks in the face. I went from
to
and the hooks are now safely away. Also I got Phase 9 up. Just two more to go!

The axe murderer that shuffles through here is going to have an easy time sneaking up on me no matter how clumsy or undead he (or she) is. No matter what hideous, incongruous noise I hear in the night, in the shower, or leaning wayyyy over the washing machine, I always blame the cats.

Heavy, thumping footsteps? It's the stripey idiot jumping around on his haunches like a kangaroo. I've only actually seen him do it once, but I recognized the sound.

The barely-perceptibible scrape of claws splintering through the door? That's his sister. She objects to doors that are closed, even if she has no interest in the other side.

Long, ominous dragging sounds?

Cabinets opening and closing like a poltergeist has the munchies?

Faint, chilling crunching sounds?

Low, sinister hisses?

Deep, throaty gibbering?

All cats. They make all those noises regularly. So unless the gibbering starts to mention R'lyeh, I'll probably sleep through it.

So, I am just nuts over Pinterest, and I have started saving paper towel and toilet paper tubes for all the myriad projects I now know of that can be made from tubes of various sizes.

Today, I discovered a new use for a toilet paper tube all on my own.

I was sorting laundry. Jean pile, t-shirt pile, undie pile, towel pile, things to iron* pile, and just as I was wondering if I should have a hoodie pile now that the weather is colder, I dropped some undies into their pile. I glanced down at the pile as I did so. Then I said "Bwah!" Because there on the floor by my unmentionables, dead as a doornail, was Mouse #3.

Had it been there the whole time? Had it been deposited there whilst I was merrily sorting? Which was worse?

There was a cat in sight, but he was paying neither of us any mind. Poor Mousie still had his head, so I knew which cat had done the deed**. But what to do? There to the right was my stash of paper tubes. So I took one and very carefully scooped the poor tattered little body up in it. Toilet paper tubes are perfect for mice. Dead ones, anyway. They fit inside and can be easily carried outside or to the nearest trash can. (I know somebody who would've used the sink disposal for mouse disposal, but that's just horrible. I couldn't bear the crunching.)

So! A new use for toilet paper tubes. Viking funerals for mice. With or without fire.





*Or in my case, things to let bounce around in the dryer before wearing.
**Do people with pets that aren't cats have serial killer MOs to follow?

Once again, I have been rendered delicious by bleach.

I bought some bleach today to see if that funky smell in the washing machine could be exorcised. The trip to Barrow is a hard one though, for man, beast, and cleaning supplies. The little jug of bleach I chose had a ding in the neck of it, but they were all damaged in some way or another. It seemed ok, so I bought it. It wasn't until I got home that I found that the ding was actually a nasty crack and there was bleach all over. Not a problem as I dumped it all in the washer anyway, but I did get some on my hands.

As soon as the cats discovered this, it was game over. Luckily I can type while rubbed, nibbled, gnawed, licked, and loved upon. If I was better at chemistry I would try to figure out what ingrediant bleach has that sets the cats off, and if I wasn't afraid of poisoning them, I would soak a toy in it for them.

Fic of the Day: Original The Biker story. I really need a name for it. He meets one of his fellow boarders under unusual circumstances.

And a bit of Ick for you. The two cats? They filled up the litterbox. In a NIGHT. I cleaned the box out and went to bed and next day, the cats were sprawled out in their usual lazy puddles.

“Ah,” they seemed to say. “Excellent. You’re awake. We have a little job for you, when you have a moment.”

My nose was way ahead of them.

“Phew!” I said. “Y’all sure are stinky today. I’ll just-WHAAAH!”

There wasn’t any loose litter in the box and two little happenings outside the box. No way just two cats could produce that much in just one night. I think they threw a party and didn’t tell me.