Mousehunt

Life as a student in Glasgow has been full of adventures and learning experiences. Life as a graduate promises to be similarly exciting - I spent my Saturday afternoon chasing a mouse around my bedroom with a pint glass, like some kind of glorified Tom and Jerry episode – and I was definitely the hapless cat figure.

I live in a flat in the Woodlands area of Glasgow – an area which, I’ve now been told, is notorious for rodent infestation. It started almost a year ago – my boyfriend at the time and I were lying in bed when we heard a strange noise. After ruling out rogue pigeons and a nearby Velcro obsessive (it seemed like a reasonable idea at the time), we came to the regrettable conclusion that we had some unwanted pets. We pulled out all the furniture, but were unable to catch a glimpse of the culprit – and indeed, over the following months, we’d occasionally hear gnawing noises coming from the walls, with the occasional odd visual manifestations of our ‘pets’ – chewed clothing, or shredded paper. But aside from these infrequent interruptions, I was largely unbothered by the mice.

At least, until one started brazenly running around my bedroom, in blatant disregard of the old ‘they’re more scared of you than you are of them’ adage. After numerous failed attempts at capturing it in a handy pint glass, I paid a visit to the local hardware shop for a more substantial weapon, coming back with two mousetraps. However, my comedy of errors was not over yet – firstly, I experienced countless moral qualms (largely unhelped by the poems of Robert Burns) about killing a defenceless mouse; albeit one running amok in my flat. I also couldn’t help remembering that those who try to catch mice generally come off worst in popular culture – Tom and Jerry, Mousehunt, possibly several other films... And secondly, when I tried to set the bloody traps I only succeeded in catching my own thumb, which hurt quite a lot and further added to my moral dilemma. I resorted to running at the mouse and shouting whenever it tried to venture into my room, and left the catching duties to my flatmates, who duly procured one small mouse in a wine glass.

There have been a couple of casualties in the battle for our flat, although I like to spring traps in some sort of militant veganist movement when the mood takes me. Rodney has been released into the wilds of Kelvingrove Park, and last time I visited his bushy abode he seemed very happy performing for all the local children. So the moral of the story is that mice are best left outside. And you can never trust an adage.