Saturday, July 7, 2018

The Mouse - A Look Back

Something a little different today.  A look back at an incident that happened a year ago tonight.  I can still get a little on edge from it.

If you're not a fan of little creatures, you may want to skip this blog.

I'm working from Jamie's account of the incident and adding a little color commentary of my own as well.

Jamie would write, "I once loved watching The ABC Weekend special, Ralph and the Motorcycle but after last nights adventure I will never look at a mouse the same way ever again."

I should preface this story by saying that we knew that a mouse had been entering Jamie's car for at least a week prior to the incident.  This was at a time when our building was having trouble with mice and we had been fighting them there as well.  We had seen the unfortunate evidence, but had never been able to catch it.  We had made several short trips in the car and had never seen it, though those had been under an hour and in daylight.  The adventure described below was neither.

Our adventure began July 7, 2017 on our way to Granna and Papa Rock's house in Buna.  Because of my work schedule, we were not able to leave until after 7:00 pm (and if I remember correctly it was closer to 8:00 pm leaving Wills Point).  Jamie was driving, giving me a break from coming home from work.

Everything went smoothly until around 9:00 pm in Jacksonville.  Then Jamie said she "discovered what my husband's terrified scream sounds like."  It was a bit more like a very startled "AHH" as I felt something crawl across my arm in the dark.  I screamed and set off a chain reaction of screams that waved through our vehicle making its way to Jamie, then Avalyn and then Jude for good measure.

We pulled over and took everything out of the car, but could not find anything. Whatever it was, it went back into hiding.  We braced ourselves, turned on all the lights in the vehicle and the music up hoping to keep the our little visitor at bay.

We were able to make it another 20 minutes down the road when a little mouse started crawling out of the air conditioning vent right next to Jamie in the driver's seat.  She started the chain reaction of screams this time. We pulled for over a second time in the middle of nowhere trying to flush it out. Of course, to no avail.

Once again, we got back in the car hoping we could hurry up and just get to the grandparents without any more sightings. Sadly, this was not so. Jamie called her dad to let him know what was going on and to ask for prayer.  In the middle of the call, while driving, the mouse crawled down her arm, jumped on her lap, and ran in a zig zag pattern down her legs. It's a miracle she was able to stay in her lane the entire drive.

We pulled over again, tried to flush it out, but we were 30 miles away from the next town.

So.... we got back in the car....again.

Next, Jamie called a friend for the craziest prayer request ever, and once again the mouse crawled across her lap as she was driving.

We finally got to the Polk gas station just outside Lufkin and gave up. Jamie refused to get back in the car and the kids were terrified.  We were still an hour and a half away from our destination. We called Granna and PapaRock asking them to come pick us up.  We were going to just leave the car there.

There was a kind gentleman who wanted to try and help get the mouse out of the car, luring it with peanut butter crackers.  Thankfully, we were able to throw open the doors and observe a mouse run out of the car toward the grass at the station.  With that mouse out of the car, we changed our plans and were determined to move the car far enough away so that mouse could not get back in.

Just as we were loading back up Jamie saw the mouse running back into the car and started screaming, "No sir, you're not getting back in here!!! Get away!!" Avalyn mirrored.

Thankfully he did. Jamie thinks she might have scared him as much as he scared us. We hurried back in the car and went, ending up clear across Lufkin at the Pilot Travel Center.  Granna and PapaRock came to the rescue and picked us up on there. We left the vehicle and enjoyed a quieter time in Buna.

That was the only mouse in the car and that has been the only such incident.  I know I am not ready for another.

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