RODENT

Most of yesterday I cleaned out the under-counter corner kitchen cupboard. Because of its inconvenient construction, I keep only things that are infrequently used in that cabinet, except for a rack, usually filled with broiler pans and trays, that just fits through the cupboard door. At some point in time during the past month, we entertained a mouse or mice in that cabinet. They had apparently gotten in through a gap in the sheet rock where the 220v electric line comes through. I also noticed that I had stored mouse poison in that cupboard the last time we had mice. The baits were entirely consumed, so I'm probably lucky I didn't find a dead mouse in the cupboard.

I'm not afraid of mice; they are just disgusting. When I was a child I noticed that Daddy would set the mouse traps, as my mother didn't have the knack or strength to do it; Mother would empty them (throw the full ones in the trash) because Daddy was too tender-hearted—a perfect partnership. At my house, I get to do both offices.

So I emptied out the pans, etc., vacuumed and pulled out shelf paper. (Yes, I used a filter mask and rubber gloves. No sense in courting Hanta virus.) Next came a bath of the entire cupboard—chlorine bleach in water. A thorough drying was followed by a good spray of disinfectant.

I filled in the access hole with some silicone grout—I couldn't find the spackle, apparently used on some other project or shuffled under the mass of garage detritus. The grout, however, just filled the hole before the tube ran out, so I figure it was meant to be.

During the drying periods, I threw out everything I could of the cupboard contents and washed the rest in hot water with chlorine in the rinse and then ran everything possible through the dishwasher on the sanitize cycle. New shelf liner went in and then a very few salvaged items that I do use once in a blue moon. Last of all the above described rack and the pans and trays. Next I need to clean out the cupboard under the sink. No mice, but I've certainly accumulated a lot of things under there.

The word of the day for February 8, 2009 is "rodent" — Pronunciation: \'rō-dənt\
Function: noun
Etymology: ultimately from Latin rodent-, rodens, present participle of rodere to gnaw; akin to Latin radere to scrape, scratch, Sanskrit radati he gnaws
Date: 1835
1 : any of an order (Rodentia) of relatively small gnawing mammals (as a mouse, squirrel, or beaver) that have in both jaws a single pair of incisors with a chisel-shaped edge. 2 : a small mammal (as a rabbit or a shrew) other than a true rodent.

Our quotation is from Robert Burns (1759–1796), Scottish poet. repr. In Poetical Works, vol. 1, ed. William Scott Douglas (1891). “To a Mouse,” st. 7 (1786):

The best laid schemes o’ mice and men Gang aft agley;
An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain, For promis’d joy!

;^)

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