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SUICIDAL MICEMUNK DEBRIEFING Lessons from the front lines of America's culture war Now that the scariest season of all is past for this year, I believe I can finally tell the tale of woe that befell this house just two weeks ago.
It was a dark and stormy night when the scratching sounds began. At first I thought I was having trouble sleeping because of a change in my workout routine, our overly warm bedroom, or perhaps work stress, but after a few days of the strange symptoms, the source of my trouble became all too clear.
Just a few days ago (though they seem immeasurably removed from my present state of nightlong ambrosial slumber) I heard a rustling sound in the middle of the night. I sat up straight, looked around, but seeing and sensing nothing, I went back to sleep until the next morning.
The next morning I made my bed as usual, saw my wife off to work, and then returned to the bedroom. There on the floor, was the unmistakable form of mouse poop. Cleaning up the small piece, I soon found another, and another. Including (*Gasp) one on the bed - right next to my pillow. Proceeding downstairs, I did a thorough search of the kitchen area where I found other numerous pieces of micro-mammal skat. And this is when I began to make my plan. While it may be acceptable to occasionally tolerate an annoying little forest mammal who takes adrenaline-pumping jaunts through the inner-sanctums of creatures a hundred times his size, it is NEVER acceptable to tolerate a potentially disease-infested rodent in the place where hearty home-cooked meals are prepared for the sustenance of this American family.
I vowed that the first time I set eyes on this creature - would be the last!
All that day he eluded me. Maybe he could sense my Machiavellian scheme to crush him into submission. I don't know. But I do know that I heard him again that night...
The next morning I awoke in a restless haze having slept fitfully (if at all) through the night and went downstairs to make Malt 'O Meal for breakfast. As I rounded the corner of my kitchen island carrying two bowls of piping-hot and delicious banana-nut cereal I was assaulted by the hilarious but unnerving sound of terrified forest mammal claws scratching my fake wood floor in a furious attempt to hide for cover.
I saw a tiny tail disappear underneath my oven (my first inkling that this daredevil was less intelligent than he appeared), paused to see if my wife had noticed the sound in the other room, discovered she had not and, calling her name, sat down to eat breakfast.
After eating, we stood up from the table and the scurrying commenced anew. Troubled by the sound, my wife cast an inquisitive look my way and as I calmly looked her in the eye I replied, "Honey, there's a mouse in the house and I'm going to take care of it." She said, "fine, ok" or something to that effect, left the house... and the battle was joined.
I went to the local supermarket and purchased two of the best mousetraps money can buy. I set them, placed them, and then went upstairs to begin my work for the day. Not more than 10 minutes later I heard the distinctive sound of dishes being tipped over in the sink and ran downstairs just in time to see what looked to be a large mouse in mid-air flying/floating through the kitchen like Air Jordan towards the protective cover of the oven. Once safe, he turned around, poked his head into view and just stared at me. I stared back. His nose twitched. My nose twitched. And then, to add insult to injury, he glanced at one of the recently placed traps -only inches from his face- and gave me a look that can only be interpreted as, "is that the best you can do?" before disappearing into the bowels of my kitchen cabinetry for the next few hours.
Back upstairs I had almost forgotten about the mouse/chipmunk/rodent/gerbil terrorist in my house until I hear a sound that sent adrenaline pumping through my veins again - scratching, clattering feet in my bedroom, this was UPSTAIRS, just a few feet from my home office.
I ran into the bedroom, slammed the door, and followed the clicking, scratching sound to the corner by my dresser. Then I waited. And waited. Finally I got down on my hands and knees and peered underneath the dresser. There he was, lungs pumping, ready to fight, and a look of fearless contempt in his eyes. I grabbed a book, stepped back, and kicked it under the dresser (hoping to scare the critter out from his hiding place where I could catch it or step on it, or both. I hadn't decided yet. But it didn't matter.
Apparently, seeing a four lb. book hurtling towards his position gave the micemunk just the jolt of adrenaline he needed to execute his most daring move yet. As expected, the micemunk ran out from underneath the dresser. But completely unexpected, he did something I never saw coming. Pulling a handbrake maneuver straight out of the Dukes of Hazard he wheeled around just as his tail had emerged from underneath the dresser, sprang into the air, and began to scale the wire rack that holds our socks and underwear. I was taken aback and could only stare in shocked disbelief as this tiny creature, not much larger than my thumb deftly climbed up to my eye-level, paused to look me in the eye (as if to say, "betcha didn't see that comin' didya, sucker?") and then continued to the top rack, just inches from the celing.
Since I didn't have anything better to do (except, of course, the work that I was supposed to be completing) I began to shake the racks. It appears that this is exactly what the micemunk had foreseen and, appearing from the depths of a bunch of old college sweatshirts he gracefully executed a leap (with, if I'm not mistaken, a mid-air pike just to taunt me) onto the top of my dresser.
I am now thinking to myself. Ok, well, since he's finally cornered (literally) and on the top of a six-foot platform surrounded on all sides, I now have to think seriously about how to pick him up. I was halfway through a thought about using a sweatshirt as a net when the micemunk revealed what I had been fearing all along:
He had been trained by the Israeli IDF.
Running to the edge of the dresser, he carefully gauged the distance between himself and the floor below, strapped on a kevlar helmet (ok... that could be an exaggeration because it all happened very very quickly) glanced over his shoulder and lept. Mission Impossible style -with all four limbs outstreched like Tom Cruise, into the 1.5 inch gap between the wall and my dresser.
I vaguely remember hearing a thud, followed by frantic scrambling sounds, and several other curiously small thuds later, but I remained my the dresser for some time, transfixed by the suicidal escape of the IDF-trained assassin micemunk.
I shuffled downstairs once I deduced that the smaller thudding sounds corresponded to the sound a small animal's body makes as it is rolling down hardwood stairs at great speed. But I didn't see anything. A short while later I hear the scurrying sound again in my bedroom. This is one of the main reasons I deduced the mammal was not your typical fuzzy little forest mammal. Why else would a creature that normally eats acorns be completely obsessed with a bedroom full of nothing but cotton and wool? You see where I'm going with this?
I raced into the room, shut the door, (but I did this last time, you say, how did the creature escape last time? You're getting ahead of yourself), and saw the animal running towards the master bathroom. "Idiotic!", I thought, as I closed the bathroom door tightly. "Now, I've got him!", I assumed. But I didn't. I herded the creature into a corner, until he was directly behind the toilet. A magazine-wielding hand to the right, an intimidating trash can on the left. What I predicted would happen was the smashing sound of the magazine would cause the creature to flee towards the trash can, which I would cover the mousemunk with, and then dispose of. Unfortunately for me, the mousemunk was crazier than I thought and had detected a weakness in my attack. I beat the floor with the magazine at a fairly steady rhythm (I used to be a drummer after all) and then paused when I heard scurrying in the direction of the trash can. This happened three times. On the fourth try, after the scurrying had started, I peered towards the trashcan and didn't see the mousemunk! Only a millisecond later I was standing by the toilet with a magazine and a trash can in an empty bathroom. The chipmouse had calculated the time between smashing sounds and deduced (like a Marine) that running DIRECTLY TOWARDS an oncoming attack was the best means of escape. He lunged directly over my hand, did a handspring off the wall (near where the toilet paper hangs), flipped over my arm, scurried to the door, squeezed himself under a crack smaller than my index finger, and was gone.
Small thuds ensued, I ran over to the stairs just in time to see the last horrible-looking impact of the creature hitting the floor at the bottom of the stairs and tearing into the kitchen -presumably to the "safety" of our oven.
Beaten again, I went back to work, but as I went upstairs I took two additional tools - a broom, and a stack of cardboard.
Soon enough, I heard the all-too familiar scurrying, scratching sound in my bedroom, and I lept to action. Closing the door, I wedged pieces of cardboard underneath it - to prevent escape. Grasping my broom I soon located the micemunk in his forward operating base under my dresser. Deftly, I flipped the munkmouse out into the open. This was the first time I was able to observe a critical weakness in my opponent's arsenal: when he kicked it into high gear to make a get-away, instead of walking on the virtually silent pads of his feet, his clams extended. This trick normally worked extremely well in the soft organic matter of wooded glens and grassy meadows, but here, in the heart of my cozy American condo, the faux-wood surface of my Pergo floor felt as smooth as glass and he peeled-out like a banana-struck driver in Mario Cart.
Making one last escape to escape he disappeared under the bed. Bending down to look, he seized on my momentary lack of focus and bolted for the door. Only, this time he couldn't fit under the crack there! Again and again, he went crashing into the door trying to make the escape he knew was possible, but always in vain. After his last heroic lung he ran for the closet and disappeared into a thousand seasonal dresses and hopelessly out-of-style shirts. Soon we were at an impasse. He couldn't escape. But I couldn't find him in the folds of a million garments. So we waited...
And waited...
Finally, I just began beating clothes in a vain attempt to shake him loose. But wherever he was, he held fast. Until, finally, he hatched his last, futile, adrenaline-fueled escape plan. He ran out of the closet, pulled one of his patented handbrake-turn maneuvers and headed in the opposite direction of the door. Confused, I shifted my weight, and re-positioned my broom. This gave him time to slip between my legs and head somewhere, ANYWHERE, but this too was futile. I hit him with the broom as he zoomed through my legs - accelerating his rate of speed exponentially - and hurtling him...
Straight into the door.
The suicidal micemunk IDF assassin was dead. I took him downstairs, put him in a ziplock bag, and threw his body (wasting an otherwise very handsome fur coat) into the garbage.
If you, or any of your friends are considering a career in micemunk espionage remember this post, and pause a moment before messing with this house. I don't like to do it, but anyone who eats my food, poops on my bed, and scares my wife, will meet with a similar fate.
That's a promise.
Christof Meyer
p.s. Since I don't really know what America's culture war is I decided this event was just as likely to be a part of it as anything.
p.p.s The animal I fought turned out to be an Eastern Chipmunk upon further investigation. The picture above is of this same fearsome creature
Posted November 02, 2009 mom Posted by: Brenda I laughed so hard I cried, but I did wonder what happened to the sweet little boy I raised who wouldn't even hurt a bug! I felt a bit sorry for the little guy though, but I totally understand how it feels to have something eating my food and pooping in my house (sounds a bit like a baby! LOL), but really it was a good laugh! (And btw, glad you won!) Posted 2009-11-09 17:43:58
Posted by: Beth Drechsel Funny story. Great writing. Before we moved into our new place I spent 8 hours cleaning the stove/oven as tiny turds were deposited all through it. Tell me, what creature would hide under the stove-top? Mice apparently. Posted 2009-11-10 13:05:36 COMMENT ON THIS POST
