The mouse and the scale

Startled by a mouse while sitting on the throne. Attacked the mouse with a bathroom scale.

First, some background:

We moved into a new tract house in 1970 that was really out in the country. The town sign still said "Population: 100". Of course that was left over from the 1960 census, but it would be correct to say that the population was small but growing rapidly (Population was about 60,000 in 2008). The old inhabitants of what had been a field/orchard just a few months before hadn't decided to move on yet. Fields/orchards => field mice. In fact, the field mice would have been happy to inhabit a barn so they tried moving into our house as a substitute. The problem was eventually resolved (closing up any openings in the house, landscaping that was less hospitable, more neighbors, more cats...) but in the early days in the house we had some "visitors".

The event:

I was in the bathroom minding my own business (actually, taking care of business) when a mouse scurried between my feet and made for the nearby wall. I was startled and reacted as anyone would and kicked the nearby scale at the mouse. I guess I hoped that this would damage the mouse but it just made a lot of noise. The racket was loud enough that it concerned my best friend (the mother of my three children) and she was further concerned when I shouted "get me a towel, NOW!". She did hand a towel in through the door that was quickly opened and closed but still didn't know what had caused the crashing sound or why a towel was needed. The towel provided a place for the mouse to believe it was safe and I was able to scoop it up and let the mouse swim for his life in the nearby "exit".

Of course, this was quite a while ago, so I may not have remembered things as they really happened. Perhaps others will want to comment :-)