Maybe I'm the Mouse...

I've seriously had it with this mouse.

Since my last entry on the matter, I've had a glass mug propped up with a nickel, then a penny to get this little bugger in my grasp. Turns out the mug is far too heavy for the teeny baby mouse to move the thing and trigger the coin to fall.

So, I've decided to pull the one string I had and picked up one of these from someone that responded to a Freecycle ad I posted:



I've got the big guns. This was given to me by a very big animal lover and after talking about things, was already trying to convert me to become a vegetarian. Before I get too much into that, we discussed strategies on how to get the mouse into this cold trap, like putting the peanut butter bait on a napkin atop the bait area to act as a ramp for it as well as a cover.

I did just that as I got home. I took all the peanut butter I had stuck on the failed mug trap and plopped it on a piece of napkin, left a little peanut on one end of the napkin ramp and easily set the trap after spending a good amount of time figuring it out (even though I did do that with the woman who gave it to me, but it didn't seem like that was the proper way). I went to bed thinking that I'd have a mouse in the trap by the morning, because up until now, I've been re-baiting traps and I've basically been feeding the thing. Now she would be MINE.

After being woken up by my roommate's leaving first thing in the morning, I got up to check the trap.

THE NAPKIN OF PEANUT BUTTER WAS COMPLETELY GONE.

I see NO trace of the napkin, which was a 2 ply swatch that probably had a 10 square in area. I would think the thing dragged the little motherload away somewhere, but I really can't see where/ how it could have been taken away anywhere that far (it's in my room). Maybe it ate its own volume in peanut butter and took the napkin with it to better cushion its fat little nest, as it awaits for its next feast. I can't believe it's evaded me again, and I'm still completely baffled as to where it is. I really hope that I don't find a peanut buttered napkin bit amongst my clothes. I'd be seriously grossed out with that.

I've had it. This little thing is too clever. What is this mouse? Did it escape from some laboratory where it's some kind of human-smart mouse baby made to irritate clueless girls who live in squalor? Maybe I'm the mouse and a mouse and I've developed some sort of schizophrenia and I eat the peanut butter when I sleep, and get trapped in shoebox traps and nibble my way out when I'm at work? What would it even mean to create a split personality of a baby mouse? Does that mean I'm lonely or just plain crazy?

I now have no napkin to "soften the blow." I have two small gobs of peanut butter in the middle of the bait tray, and I made sure the trigger is pretty sensitive. My biggest concern is the fact that it's a teeny thing and it won't even have the weight to trigger that already sensitive switch. But I've seriously had it with this mouse. I'm almost afraid that if this method doesn't work, I may just settle for a kill trap...

...okay not really, but I'm seriously tired of this mouse.