Scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch . . .

I tried to ignore it but discovered that ignoring it wouldn’t make the reality of a mouse in the bedroom go away.

The lights went on.

I quietly stalked the scratching creature, but I am not a good hunter when I am only in my underclothing.

The lights went off.

Moments later, the small creature ran across my chest and over my pillow. “Get up!” I yelled to my wife. “There is a mouse in the bed!”

The lights went on.

Now we were both stalking the creature. My wife saw it first running along the wall. I knew that I would be facing the task of disposing of the creature and looked around for something to use. That is when I saw my winter gloves sitting on my shelf by my bed. I put them on and returned to the hunt.

The mouse ran into our closet and with a little coaxing from Brenda, it ran behind a small set of drawers into my gloved hands. Now what? I didn’t want to kill it but I must be a man in front of my wife. “Squish it ?” I thought as the mouse wiggled inside of my gloved palms. “Throw it into the yard!” said Brenda. With great relief at not needing to sacrifice my male ego, we ran down the hall to the front door. She opened the door, I swung my arms, opened my gloved hands and saw with my own eyes that mice can fly. The small furry dark spot flew into the dark night sky and disappeared.

We both stood there disrobed with the front door wide open, but I wasn’t embarrassed because I was wearing gloves.

He is all white with soft pink eyes but there is nothing “soft” about Benjamin Bunny. Inch long claws have carved scars into the flesh of several family members. I use to laugh at the killer rabbit in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, but now I know that that show was a documentary.

“I’m an orphan!” my youngest said to her friend proudly.
“No your not!”
“Yes I am! My mom and dad said so!”

We just stopped at my parents for a minute to pick up 2 children. Surely Pria would be OK in the front yard. As we planned to leave we called for her and she didn’t come. Then we heard the fireworks from down the street. She hates fireworks. We looked and called and looked and called the police and looked until dark. It was no use, she could be anywhere and fireworks were going off all over town.

After 10 years the rope finally breaks and our swing is a sit. I am so glad it didn’t involve a visit to the emergency room. This is how it went down.

Bad grades in Algebra. How can that be? It can be because she reads all day. We had to ground her from books.

As we left for our doctors appointment/wedding/family reunion last week I locked the front door and walked past out front flower bed on the way to the car. We have been getting complements since the flowers started to bloom. I would take some credit, but all credit belongs to a kind neighbor who planted it for us when we were in Salt Lake recovering from Liver Transplant. The neighbor is the kind of gardener that plants with a ruler. All of the plants are just the right height and just the right distance apart.

Goats can climb trees. I’ve heard about it, but now I’ve seen it. It makes sense, they climb mountains. Well, goats also like more than anything else, the one thing that is just out of reach. They climb and strain and struggle when right around them is all they could ever want. I guess there is a good reason baby goats are called kids.

When everyone comes home from camping trips they bring a mountain of work with them. I never knew we had so many clothes. I helped fold and fold and fold. Just when I thought we were making progress another mountain would loom up before us. The white flag at the top is not a victory flag, it is for surrender. I think unlike Everest, laundry is a mountain that no one will ever finish climbing.