requiem for bugs bunny

Just two weeks ago, summer was lush and verdant.  The garden promised bountiful produce that would put a table full of vegetables on our table, as well as a steady supply for many family members and friends.


That was before the drought and heat of June.  It seemed as though our garden turned overnight from a thing of lush green beauty to a thing of dried up tinder.  


We still had some tomatoes though...and Steve prayed for rain on the late beans that had some tender young small beans starting to sprout.  And the rain did start...yesterday.

Then Bugs Bunny arrived. Steve turned from a loving gramps into a stalker of bunny tails...one tail in particular.  He cussed and ranted and I laughed, thinking he wouldn't bother one little bunny who couldn't possibly eat what was left of the garden...


Wrong.  Just like Steve believes every snake is a poisonous snake, he gave this rabbit the power of a legendary jackalope.
And turned into Elmer Fudd...with a rifle.  (Remember we live in the country, where carrying a gun in your yard is a natural thing, and using said gun doesn't even make the neighbors jump.)


As I drove up tonight, I saw Bugs sitting in our yard, and he saw me, and ran to the beans.  I went on inside and told Steve that Bugs was back and doing well, sitting right in the middle of our beans.  I had to jump back out of the way as Steve grabbed his rifle and ran barefoot into our yard (which has more stickers than grass in it), and stalked poor Bugs down and blasted him into the hereafter.


Bless you Bugs... Requiescat in pace ...


I will think of you with every bean and tomato I don't pick.      




...life is good. ~cath 
@jonesbabie on Twitter

mousecapade

Friday was one of those weird days you hope you don't have to experience again for a long time.  It started out strange and ended on a bizarre note that no one would believe, if I didn't have the evidence.

We'd been out getting Stevie Wonder a high octane checkup, had a nice lunch out and of course, the requisite Starbucks (I can't go to Birmingham without getting a Tazo Chai Latte).

At home that evening, SW went to bed early because the stress test had whipped his butt (it was a Thallium stress test, and let me tell you, walking a treadmill is nothing to getting zapped by medication to stress your heart).  That was when it started.  I saw movement from the corner of my eye, and looked at the floor in front of the TV.

There sat a mouse, looking back at me.

I screamed.  Don't ask me why.  I had a pet rat when I was a kid and I wasn't afraid of a mouse.  I think he just startled me.  I heard Steve roaring "WHAT THE HELL'S THE MATTER?" behind his CPap and I hollered back:

"THERE'S A MOUSE IN HERE!  A BIG ONE!"

I heard him grumbling as he got out of bed.  I won't set traps.  That's his job.  I tell him about the mice, he sets the traps, and disposes of the DBs.  (That is Dead Bodies for those of you who don't watch CSI.)

I had reported the mouse.  There was a trap in the kitchen that had been sprung.  He came in and reset it.  And set two more in different parts of the house.  I was laughing out loud by the time he finished.  What is funny about setting traps?  It isn't the traps.  It's watching a grown man in his underwear try to set the trap, and having it snap on him, and hearing him cuss.  Pretty entertaining stuff from my perch on the couch.

While he was setting them, we watched the mouse run from room to room.  I figured he was hungry and would get trapped pretty dang quick.

Nope.  He ran right by those traps like they weren't even there.  That is when I realized he was different.  Unique.  Weird.  Scary.

I watched him run right out into the living room and look at me.  He just sat there, staring.  I screamed.  Stevie Wonder cussed.  And got up.

I said: "Look, he's sitting right there, and LOOKING AT ME."

Steve said: "Hit him with a damn shoe."

I said: "I have crummy aim.  You do it."

Steve said: "Oh hell, give me a shoe."  (in a disgusted voice)

He grabbed his shoe and I told him to wait, the mouse would come out.  And it did.  Straight out in front of Steve.  He drew back like the best big league pitcher I've ever seen and threw his show at that mouse.  It had to be doing 90 miles an hour when it hit it.

The mouse turned and ran.  Steve looked a few more minutes, chased it out from it's hiding spot in my future laundry room, and got a couple more shots off.  It WAS moving slower though.  And stopping in weird spots, like the middle of the room.  No decent mouse stops in the middle of a room.  It just isn't safe.

Steve finally said he was done, and going back to bed.  The mouse had hidden by that point, and I figured the traps would get him sooner or later.  I was thinking about that other half hamburger from Red Robin I had brought home from lunch, and decided to warm it in the microwave and eat it.

Big mistake.  The lingering aroma of burger not only brought the mouse OUT of hiding, it brought him straight to the couch.  I had my legs wrapped around my head by this point and was hollering at Steve, who refused to get back up at that point.  The mouse stopped at the edge of the couch, and leaned UP on it and looked up at me.  We were both staring at each other bug eyed by then.

I knew I would have to take measures.  SW was useless by this point, and I knew it was up to me.  I braced myself and the race was on.  I chased the mouse from room to room, and got a couple shots at it with SW's tennis shoe (those things weigh about 10 pounds each).  But never could stop it.  At some point in the chase, I decided to get my iPhone and capture the evidence on camera.  This is what I got:

mouse running

mouse still running

mouse running some more

This went on for quite a while.  The reason the photos are blurry is because I was running with him, and kind of jumping up and down at the same time.

I finally cornered lost him, and sat down to catch my breath.  Then I heard a commotion in the kitchen.  And saw the cord swinging that hung down from SW's coffee grinder on the corner cabinet in the kitchen.  I looked around, and spotted him.  He was catching his breath too.

Just in case you doubt me, here's a close up:   

mouse at rest on SW's coffee grinder

I looked at him, he looked at me, and that was when my mother took over in me.  I grabbed a fly flap (you call them fly swatters), and chased him to the edge of the cabinet.  Just as he was about to jump, I finished him off.  Slam dunk.

I think this is the first time a mouse was slain with a fly flap.

Being me, I left the DB for Stevie Wonder.  Who didn't notice it the next morning until I pointed it out.  (Pffttt, some hunter he is...didn't even see what was in front of his nose toes.)

Then I told him it had been all over his coffee grinder.  And turned around and walked off.

I drink tea.

~cath xo
Twitter @jonesbabie