So I figured I’d better give Nina-the-Cat the due respect and let you all know that she indirectly did her job. She sniffed out the source of the mouse peeeeeeps and we managed to remove the mouse (stuck to a sticky mouse trap!) and (humanely, I believe) relieved it of its kitchen duties at our house.
What happened is that on the morning after my first night as cat-sitter, I walked into the kitchen to find Nina mouse-merized in front of the stove. From under the stove, the peeps I had heard the morning before were still there and now somewhat more desperate. Dammit, I thought. As I got down on my knees and peered under the stove, I saw a) a huge gross cockroach stuck to the sticky pad and b) a soft, furry and very fleshy mouse butt, also stuck to the sticky pad.
With a gentle scream I was up and out of the apartment and in front of the Super’s door (trust the mouse drama to go down on a week when John’s out of town, right?). After many clicks of the doorbell, the Super opened (keep in mind this was just after 7am) and I explained the situation to him. I don’t know if it was my hysteria or the fact that I was only partially dressed (!), but he offered to immediately come down and remove and kill the mouse. ‘No!’ I said – ‘Don’t kill it!’ at which he laughed and said in his heavy accent, “But vot else must aai dooo to a mouse zat is stuck on a paeeeed?”. I thought about it and told him that he could do whatever he wanted to, as long as he did it after I left home.
Needless to say, I did not have breakfast that morning and I did not see the fleshy mouse butt again. What I do know is that the mouse is probably running around with the hugest grin on its face, somewhere on the Great Lawn of Central Park, clutching a huge piece of Cheddar in its paws. Don’t you agree?