Mice, Mice Baby

So, Minnie, our foxhound mutt has been spending a lot of time lately laying in front of the kitchen sink.  I haven't really thought too much about it.  The kitchen floors are hard wood, thus cool, thus a great place to lay when it's 108 degrees outside.  Granted, there are other areas of the house that have hard wood and some areas that have stone.  The stone would be even cooler to lay on, but she is what my husband affectionately calls "an idiot."  Also, there constantly seems to be food out on the kitchen counter these days.  We've all had crazy & differing schedules and we haven't eaten together as a family in forever.  Someone is constantly in the kitchen cooking or at least grabbing left-overs out of the fridge.  So Minnie spending a lot of time in the kitchen didn't seem all that weird.

This morning, I'm in the living room busily checking Facebook statuses and sadly reading about Diana Nyad being forced to quit her big swim when I hear the kitchen trash can rustling.  "MINNIE!!" I screamed, "Get out of the trash!"  The rustling noise continued.  Hmmm.  Besides, didn't Hubby fix that pull out trash can door so that Minnie couldn't open it anymore?  I yelled again.  The rustling continued.  What could she be doing?  I'd just emptied the trash 15 minutes or so earlier.  I got up & went to the kitchen prepared to whip Minnie's little butt for getting in the trash.

No Minnie.  The kitchen was empty.

Weird.  I KNOW I heard the sound of doggies in the trash can.

I started back towards the living room, and....  rustle, rustle, rustle.

Crud!  There is something behind that closed trash can cabinet door.  Something alive.  Double crud.

I took a deep breath and yanked the door open.  And there was the mouse.  Actually, it was mouse eyes.  He was inside the empty trash can, just inches from the top, staring at me with huge, gigantic, black beady eyes.  I swear his eyes were bigger than he was.  Except he did look a little plump.  Triple crud!  Guess I'm going to have to go check the status of our pantry after I figure out how to get rid of this killer mouse.  Because you know, mice are deadly.  At least they seem that way when you are the one having to deal with them and their beady gigantic eyes.

I quickly grabbed the trash can, sort of shook it a bit to shake the mouse down deeper & ran for the back door.  Opened the door and tossed the entire trash can out into the yard.  And that is where it will stay until Hubby comes home.  Because you know that killer mouse could still be hiding in it.