Somewhere but Nowhere: The Slumber Games

For a change my schedule has been filled with work. I spent nearly the last four weeks in Kampala prepping for the upcoming National Camp GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) where I am one of the Co-Directors this year… more on that later. The week before I left I had not seen my cat and figured he was roaming around the village munching on avocados . I’ve been gone for almost a month and have been home for about 5 days meow with no sign of him. Bummer. He was a cool cat but I can get by just fine without him… or that’s what I thought until the sun went down that first night.

I was exhausted from traveling only 100 km that took nearly 7 hours due to an unfortunate event on the way home. A dump truck decided to back up into my moving bus and tear a few metal panels off the side. It looked like a T-Rex got ahold of my bus. Packages in the storage containers were sliced open and all passengers were forced to wait an hour and a half until we could continue. The plus side is that the tires were fine so we were still able to drive… we were just a bit less aerodynamic. I get back to site and its eerily quiet. Not a child in site. I sit down on my stoop and take in the stars when all of a sudden I hear running. 20 seconds later I am surrounded by children and held hostage by their grip. It felt so good to feel so missed and finally be in my own home! I unlock the padlock and open the door... BOOM my house is a disaster! I swore there was another earthquake and my house was ground zero.

(PAUSE: I just ran out of A-1 sauce for my omelet. bummer)

Only one way to fix this before I pass out from exhaustion… MUSIC! So I had an impromptu dance party with the kids while I cleaned like a banshee for the next few hours.

My house is clean… I am clean… time for bed. FINALLY! I am so excited to sleep in my own bed again with my green force field of a mosquito net protecting me.

1:00 am …. Silence.

2:15am…. Silence.

2:48am… Silence.

3:05am… SQUEEK! SQUEEK! Munch nibble munch munch…

Ugh. Not again!

For those of you who haven’t been reading my blog from the beginning, when I first arrived at my new site back in July 2012 this is how I lived for MONTHS until I got a cat. Not happy. I would wake up and ‘meow’ a couple of times until the mice would scamper away and bug someone else. These suckers can be LOUD! Don’t ever believe anyone when they use the expression ‘quiet as a mouse’ because it’s a lie. They may be clever and but these mice/ rat-beasts know how to party. Maybe it’s a special Uganda breed… party time till the rooster starts crowing at dawn.

Back to 3:05am:

I get out of bed with my nearly-dead flashlight in one hand and my machete in the other. I’m playing ‘hot lava’ and jumping from chair to chair to avoid any contact with the squeekers. I’m not quite sure what I was thinking at this point but I didn’t find anything so I stepped back onto the floor and headed around the corner to my bed when the little bumper car runs into my foot and runs away! I once had a mole run into my boot when I worked in Oregon and thought it was hilarious… but this?! No. My feet are vulnerable and unprotected! Plus rodents should be able to see, at least the mole had a pretty good excuse! Mouse 1. Meish 0.

In the morning I thought the events of last night were too ridiculous that I didn't want to tell anyone because I thought it was a dream… until I was disturbed from my sleep once again at 3:00am. Ugh. This time I am extra cautious. I hear where the little guy is hiding and I try and startle him by banging on my table with the end of the broomstick. No response. Okay… where did he go? I let my guard down for 8 seconds and the thing flies out from the shelf and bumps into my foot yet again! Once… okay I’m over it… Twice… I’m a little annoyed by the lack of space he is giving my bare feet. This time I chase after him with my flashlight and find him huddled in a corner. I hesitate with the broom in my hand. ZOOM. He flies past me and heads for the wires that lead up to the ceiling. He’s about shoulder height and I go to swing my broom but I hesitate again because I’m fascinated by the way he is climbing. Dumb. Mouse 2. Meish 0.

By the third night I’m exhausted. The rooster, who wasn’t here four weeks ago, woke me up at 6:00am then the kids came yelling shortly after at 7:00am to ask if we were going to watch Spider-Man today. I just need some solid sleep so I can dream about anything but mice. 3:00am arrives and I’m still sleeping. Yessss. 3:15am strikes the clock and I’m woken up by a can falling off the shelf. Great. I bang on the wall and I can hear a mouse climb back to the ceiling… glad that worked. 4:30am I wake up to the noise of something else falling off my shelves. With my flashlight and broom (mind you this is a village broom and consists of twigs tied together) in hand I head for the noise. Standing on my couch I hear a slight shuffle on the shelves in front of me. I quietly slide to the ground and step closer to the noise. This time I am ready for whatever comes at me. Batter up. Now before you say anything I want to let you know I spent a whole 20 minutes deciding which object in my house would help me get rid of this mouse more efficiently and here is what I came up with and why I decided to go with the broom…

Shovel (too ‘Grave Digger’)

Olive Oil Bottle (too classy and not enough reach)

Poison (too unclean and horrible)

Trapping it under a pot (too risky)

Shoe (too lame)

Village Broom (good weight and long reach)

Well I never actually got to use any of those but not for the reason you may be thinking. If you haven’t gotten the hint already I killed Micky Mouse in my house. That wasn’t supposed to be a rhyme by the way, sometimes things like this just happen. I heard the noise. I KNEW where it was coming from. The problem was when I cleared the shelf there was nothing left. At this point you could only hear a faint vibration like he was shaking. I could hardly hear the noise. I would put my face near one shelf and listen… hear it faintly… then move down a shelf and hear it a little bit clearer. The shelf it was coming from was now completely empty… weird. Before giving up again I got the bright idea to look behind the bookshelf. There he was… looking like a rock climber wedged about half way up the back side of the shelf. We stared at each other for at least a minute. I was admiring his big ears, beady eyes, and little pink nose when he was probably plotting how he could bump into my foot again even though I was standing on a chair. If I could share one… two pieces of advice from my adventures last night it would be: Don’t look something you are about to kill in the eyes and always remember to be creative. My broom wasn’t going to work and I was tired. By this point in the night I just wanted to get back in bed and cuddle with my blankets. It was 5:45am and my mind and body were about to go back to sleep without my permission. I remember pacing back and forth while having an internal conversation with myself; ‘you have to do it.’ ‘Just do it and get it over with.’ ‘It’s heavy enough.’ ‘No. You can’t keep him as a pet.’ ‘I know he’s cute but there are still plenty more living in your ceiling.’ ‘Just push it already.’

It was a quick death. I stood in front of the shelf and put my shoulder into it... double tap for good luck. I killed a mouse with a 6x4ft bookshelf. That’s correct. 6:00am strikes and the rooster starts crowing so I can’t even enjoy the silence that I worked so hard for. Who the heck does that?! If this was a new version of the movie ‘Zombiland’ I think this qualifies for at least an honorable mention for kill of the week.

Sometimes the things I do in the Peace Corps still surprise me. Now I will ALWAYS have a story to tell about the time when I killed a mouse with a bookshelf. Only in Uganda.

Mouse: 2 Meish: win by default

(This is my life)