'cepttimber....

**getsome** · 09-29-2021, 06:21 PM

Tip of the day, how to start up a conversation with a complete stranger……A few years back when I was in sales my employer sent us to a class on public speaking and one of the things they taught us was that if you wanted to get someone to start talking all you needed to do was ask them a question about their personal life and they would open right up…….My best line to get customers talking about themselves and what was on their mind was “What in the hell is wrong with you, are you a total idiot”…….It worked great but I guess it explains why I’m no longer in sales…..

**Armybrat** · 09-29-2021, 07:57 PM

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**yqtszhj** · 09-29-2021, 08:42 PM

Tale of the Rat (actually, it was a mouse)

in early summer I was outside the garage and saw this mouse. It was gasping it’s last breath so I mercifully put it out of its misery. Thought that was the end, but no. I think they are seeking vengeance.

So then about 3 months ago I was sitting in the kitchen with the wife and daughter. Out the corner of my eye I saw something move and looked and there was a mouse running under the edge of the kitchen cabinet. It saw us and turned around and hid behind some stuff in the corner. Well the wife and daughter freaked out. Thought about shooting it but figured that would make a mess. So we blocked off the kitchen, I set a trap, and in a couple of hours we caught it. I wondered how it got in. The wife said she thought she heard something under the kitchen sink a couple of nights before. So I looked under there a saw the little bugger had chewed his way through next to the plumbing for the sink. No problem plugged it up with a Brillo pad and that was that, right? Wrong.

A week or so later a saw some mouse turd in the garage. What the……? So I set a trap in the garage, Next morning what did I have? HALF A MOUSE! Something chewed the head off the trapped mouse. So, set another trap. 3 hours later, mouse number 3. Enough is enough. I set traps all over the garage. They have stayed empty. Problem solved, right? WRONG.

2 weeks ago I ask the wife to ride with me in the truck out to the shooting range. I leave my truck parked outside. About half way there we round a curve and there are 3 calves in the road. I slam on the brakes and fortunately miss the cows. About a mile later the wife covers her nose and said “what did you drive through?!” I said what? She said something stinks. It smells like pee in here. Well I didn’t smell anything. So we continue on. A week later we go for a drive one night and she says again something stinks! Well I smell a little something that time. Smells like a barnyard. So we carry on with our night out and right before we get home the blower motor on my air conditioning starts making a huge racket. I thought well, I’ll work on it in a day or so.

I go out yesterday to work on the truck. When I open the door I’m like something kinda stinks. So I pull the blower motor and see some leaves. Well no big deal, the truck stays parked outdoor. That must have been what was making the racket. Upon closer inspection I see not 1, not 2, but 3 baby mouse carcasses imbedded in the blades of the fan. Then it hits me! Oh my gosh, that stinking smell! So I pull the fan off the motor and soak it in a bucket of soap and water. Then I start looking in the vent housing and oh no. That fan made margaritaville out of those mice and I had mouse innards all inside that housing. So I get the Lysol and start cleaning the inside. Fortunately in was easy to get to and there wasn’t much guts from such small mice. I got the fan cleaned up, put it all back together, and everything worked ok, smell wasn’t too bad but still won’t pass the wife test yet. But, problem solved, right? WRONG.

I start reading today online about these issues and there are stories galore. So I go back out today and pop the hood and there is mouse turds on top of the engine, you could tell it had been eating on the valve cover, and there was other nesting evidence in the air intake box that holds the air filter. So, I clean all that out, cover everything with peppermint oil that all sources say mice hate, and we’ll see how it goes now.

there have been a lot of mice outside this year. There are not any food sources on my property but it may be my neighbors. If I have to I’m going to get me one of those trap things where the mice fall into the bucket and see how many I can get.

**getsome** · 09-29-2021, 09:45 PM

Brotherman, I feel your pain….I am currently at war with squirrels that want to move in my attic for the winter…..I work nights and when you hear gnawing above your head at 6am it makes you a little crazy, one morning it got so bad I took a .38 loaded with snake shot up there to kill the little SOB but he ran off before I could get a shot at him, I thought about calling in an air strike but since then I have purchased an expensive but very accurate scoped air rifle and have become a deck sniper…..So far 4 down and 1 to go, I hope the little bastards talk to each other and say, dude what happened to Billy, he was just up the tree with me and now he’s not moving and all stiff……

Our last house had a pool and my wife’s elderly aunt lived with us and she had to have a well stocked bird feeder to look at all day so with a constant food and water supply available we developed a huge RAT problem big time which was not fun to fight……About this time of year when it started to get colder I fired up the outdoor gas pool water heater one evening and about 50 baby rats came running out of that thing on fire, I felt bad for a second but I got over it pretty quick…..

**BirdsThaWord** · 09-30-2021, 04:47 AM

I had mice 2 years ago. I know what that’s like. They were always either fighting or effing up there late at night and drove us nuts. Finally found where they were getting in and built a one way spring loaded door. Suckers even chewed through wiring before I booted them, caussing a back rooms ceiling fan to go dead, which I’ve yet to fix. Interestingly, beneath where our owl who lives in the garage, there was a partial carcass a few days after the trap door install. Must have been scurrying around at night trying to find another entrance and Mr Owl (as we call him) spotted him.