A declaration of war
Within reason, we welcome visitors to The Manor.
Obviously we’re not going to welcome people we don’t like but in general the door is open for anyone provided they follow some simple rules of the house.
Our rules are fairly straightforward. Anyone who doesn’t like smoke is more than welcome provided they don’t mind sitting in the garden. We would ask visitors to refrain from helping themselves from our food supply [with the possible exception of Daughter but then only if she’s cooking a meal for us]. Another rule which I am fairly strict about is that we won’t tolerate visitors who shit on the kitchen worktops or shelves.
We had a visitor a couple of months back who abided by all the rules. He was quiet, obeyed all the rules and we became quite fond of him. He was welcome to stay.
But he vanished.
Now he’s back but has brought a couple of mates with him and they are violating two rules [not the one about smoking]. So they are no longer welcome. Far from being welcome, I have declared outright war and I will show no mercy.
I have set up the barricades. Everything edible is now contained either in tins, glass or hard plastic. They can fuck themselves if they think they can indiscriminately raid my sugar or Oxo cubes. The traps are set.
I’m just waiting now for the clack-squeak sound of success.
Ah, those kind of visitors. We had a couple of those awhile back but we also have 4 indoor cats. Doesn’t take long before the “visitors” are lying belly up and waiting to be taken outside for an “air-burial”.
The trouble with cats is that they require even more maintenance than the mice, and I speak from bitter experience. I just wish Penny would take an interest. She just watches the mouse scurrying along the floor and then looks at me with an expression that say “what the fuck was that?
I find the rind of blue cheese is a good bait (and I leave it anyway). Have you tried to buy traps lately? the size seems to have gone up – obese meese perhaps?
Peanut butter! I have a jar of the stuff which is purely for bait [I can’t stand the stuff]. The little bastards just lick the bait off each time. The trap is hair-trigger too and goes off if I so much as look at it. Maybe they’ll just die of peanut butter obesity?
If you use a catch-em-live trap you can decant them into an unused hamster cage and they make quite engaging pets (although never tame, and they can jump out as soon as you open the door). And if you get fed up with them you can always turf them out into someone else’s garden 🙂
Just another inhabitant to care for? Nah! I’ll be brutal with the little buggers – mice and wasps are on my kill list.
Wasps existed for 100 million years before bees evolved. They pollinate nearly 1000 species, 160 exclusively. Please see these little insects as eco friends and essential to nature!
I appreciate that you are right, but I can only accept the argument up to the point at which I am face to face with their (the wasps) latest attempt to colonise one of my air bricks. In the end I bought some fine mesh grilles – I never realised I had so many airbricks, but the wasps were colonising a fresh one every year.
Anyhow, the grilles have a fine enough mesh to stop entry to the Queen, (even so, I bet Meghan Markle could find a way in if there were a camera present) so this year (for the first in many) I have no wasps!
Right! I will accept the argument with the proviso that they don’t nest here. We had a nest in next door’s roof a few years back and one evening they all decided to migrate into my bathroom. Thousands of them. That was not very pleasant and I confess to mass murder then and I claim Self Defence.
But they are now off my kill list.