Recently, we discovered a mouse in the house.  Walking into the kitchen one evening, I was startled to find a little grey fellow trying to leap out of the sink.  Apparently drawn in by food scraps, his vertical leap increased tenfold when I flicked on the lights and headed over to investigate.  Blasting out of the farmhouse style basin, he shot across the counter and behind the stove.  GREAT.  On the bright side, I thought, at least he didn’t fall prey to the In-Sink-Erator.

So, it was time to find a mouse trap.  Years ago, we had mice in the basement of the house I grew up in.  I recall the hilarious traps quite well.  Straight out of Tom and Jerry, they had a wooden base with a shockingly strong steel trap for snaring Sir Mousykins.  Insert tiny cube of Swiss cheese and you had a cartoon come to life.

We can pretend I didn’t want to use this type of trap because of 3 tiny children loose in the house and the potential for injury.  The reality is that a spider the size of your pinky nail makes me wither into a pool of worthless goo.  So, the thought of smashing a mouse in half and then picking it up to dispose of didn’t exactly get me going.

Imagine my relief, upon arrival to Home Depot, to discover that Ortho makes mouse traps for me.  Right on the label, it states “No see, no mess disposal”.  Ahhh, I don’t have to see the rodent I’m about to obliterate?  Now we’re talking.  Plus, it has absurd features like a tiny red bait door and an indicator lever with things like “Not Set, Set and Mouse Caught!” written all over it.  Made me feel like I was building some kind of fun game, not eradicating rodents. And no poison to worry about with that bait door.  In fact, they suggest smearing some peanut butter in there to entice His Mousyness.

So, I followed the instructions verbatim. Loaded the bait door, set the lever and placed the trap.  I then RACED into my bedroom and SLAMMED the door so as to avoid being attacked.  And apparently peanut butter is the mouse equivalent of crack.  Mouse #1 was eliminated in under 10 minutes.  Mouse #2 (the next evening) was disappeared in less than 3.  The loud THWHACK is pretty hard to miss.

The next morning, I grabbed the well placed hand hold and tossed the whole mouse hut in the trash.  This one time, I felt no remorse at filling landfills with wildly unnecessary amounts of plastic.  So, if a 3 inch, 9 oz. rodent makes you want to run and hide, the wizards at Ortho have a trap for you.