discombobulated

This morning, when I was taking the dog out I stood staring at nothing as I often do when I realized that I was watching a mouse walk drunkenly in circles under the deck. So after Willow was done I walked over there with her. I didn't see the mouse and so I prepared to leave when it moved. It was a deer mouse.

If you've never seen a deer mouse, they are actually really cute. They have a pretty golden brown coat with a white belly. Their tail is long but not scaley. They have neat round ears and tear drop eyes (as if they were drawn for a Precious Moments figurine).

The also carry the Hantavirus. I found out about the hantavirus six years ago when we had our one and only mouse in the house. We trapped it with a sticky trap because we couldn't stand the idea of snapping it in snap trap. We caught it and then didn't know what to do with it. Fortunately, it was trash day. Our trash had already been picked up but the trash for the people across the street had not so hubby put it in their trash.

It was a cute mouse so I researched it because I had never seen a mouse like it before. So now I know. I remember after we trapped that mouse I was paranoid for well over a month.

So this morning, I was rather freaked out. When I went out with the girls later I told them they could not play under the deck. Just then I saw our neighbor. I hailed her and went over to talk to her when I saw the mouse right in front of me. So I sent DramaQueen to get me a shovel and I hit it several times and then I scooped it up and carried out to the street.

Later I went into the front yard to bring our trash can in (it was trash day). And there was that mouse circling right next to the trash can (which was quite far from where I tossed it in the street). So I got the shovel and smashed it again and then tossed it into the middle of the street and stood in the middle of the street smashing it until I was certain it was dead.

This morning, I googled to see if mice with the hantavirus have symptoms. They don't. So then I googled mouse running in circles and found that most people believed that it was either suffering from poison, had had a stroke, or had an inner-ear infection, I also heard people mention a waltzing disease but found nothing on it. I also found more than one YouTube video of mice running circles.

Apparently, I've emotionally damaged the girls as it is all they talk about and when we were out getting a few groceries they told everyone.

Tonight the girls have dance recital. The photo at the top is a practice photo as I volunteered to photograph all the girls at the recital.