Mice, no Rat, no Monster Rat

Today, I was sitting peacefully at the table planning out our meals for the week, making a grocery list and getting everyone moving towards leaving the house for school.  Mac come tearing down the stairs, "Mom, Mom, there is a mouse in my room."

Great.  There are somethings that are man's work.  I usually get stuck handling them because Bob is NEVER home when man-things go wrong.  When we had a dead mouse in our recycling bin when we lived in Connecticut, I had to deal with it.  I had to deal with the dead rabbits in our backyard.  I usually have to deal with the trash.  Hmm, Bob has been home for some of the more recent man-thing issues, and I still end up doing them.  Makes me wonder about that.  I will have to be more aware for the future.

Mac told me he thought the mouse was dead.  This was a relief, because at least I didn't have to deal with the rabid fangs of an errant mouse lunging out at me.  As the story went on, our simple dead mouse morphed into a rat, granted the beast stayed dead.  I went up to inspect.  Mac says that it is living in the box spring of his bed.  There is a tear in the fabric that covers the bottom and something was curled up in the far back corner.

This is where I start to get worried.  I am not totally convinced that this furry thing in the bed is a rodent, but I am also not convinced that it isn't a rodent.  Bob is home, so I will ask him to investigate this issue.  I hate rodents, more than spiders, ants, but probably not as much as snakes.  Bob is on the phone and won't get off the phone to look into the situation.  So, I get stuck doing more man-things.

I call the dog in for backup.  At least if I have to do arm to arm combat with a mouse/rat, I want to have the scales tipped to my side.  I put my shoes on, grab a broom and a dust pan.  If it is dead, I want to be able to remove it without touching it. 

I poke around on the bottom of the bed in ratland.  Nothing moves.  I feel that it is probably more likely that this is maybe a sock and less likey a dead rodent.  The dog is looking at me like, what am I doing up here.  I also felt that if something had been dead under Mac's bed she might have noticed.  But, it was Mac's room, so that dead animal smell is sort of normal.

Back to the topic at hand, I poke the lump, it doesn't move and it really does not feel heavy enough to be a mouse/rat/sewer rat.  The tails on those things are so gross.  Anyway, I feel confident enough to try and pull it out with the broom and deal with what ever it is.  As I start to pull it towards me, it starts to break up a bit.  So, that means it isn't a sock, but it most likely isn't a monster rat either.

Turns out it was just a piece of stuffing from the bed.  NO signs of rodents living there.  This was a relief, but I still think the kid needs to clean his room, because it could totally support a family of mice without a problem.