If you’ve known me for six months you will learn two things; I show off my tits and have an addiction to Orbits Wintermint gum. If we pass the six-month mark you will see I am something of a hypochondriac and I am always trying to lose ten pounds.
My roommate has known me for four years so when I found mice in our kitchen she was not surprised by my reaction; throw out the toaster oven, disinfect the apartment, refuse to cook and call the New York Department of Health.
The situation unfolded when she went upstate one weekend to visit her parents. Alone in the apartment, I got a few good days in of 3M-safety mask wearing, chemical disinfecting bonanza. But when my roommate returned home, dishes reappeared in the sink, cereal was not immediately transferred into plastic Tupperware, and the mice returned.
My roommate just wasn’t as freaked by the thought of microscopic fecal matter containing diseases and viruses lingering on our stove and counter space and mixing with our food products and sponges. She didn’t spook easy by the thought of little shit turds lingering in our oven and potentially causing boils, rashes, trips to the doctor’s office, thousands of dollars in medical bills, the use of creams, ointments, puss-filled sacks and awkward conversations with significant other’s about the acquiring of such puss filled sacks. Mice just didn’t freak her out as much as me. After weeks of spraying and wiping surfaces, moping and falling asleep to the sound of tiny feet running around my kitchen, (yes I could hear the mice from my bedroom), I was so morally defeated that I decided to learn the mechanics of properly destroying mice.
I made a few phone calls in earnest attempt to learn all about ridding my life of mice and their waste products. And I’ll have you know, New York Department of Health does not embrace the pressing questions of bonafide hypochondriacs. The first guy I talked to gave me the number to a homeopathic ecological research farm in Pasadena who told I should never use anything more abrasive than lemon juice on any surface ever. Then I called 311 who patched me through to the Housing Department who hung up on me. I called the New York Department of Health one more time before giving up and this time I had some luck. Jack took my call.
“Thank you for calling the city of New York, this is Jack.”
“Hi Jack, I have a question about removing fecal matter.”
“What type of fecal matter?”
“I have mice in my kitchen. They shit all over everything, especially the inside of my oven. Not the real inside but in between the range and the oven where all the gas pipes are. I’ve disinfected everything else, but I’m just wondering if it’s ok to use antibacterial spray down there or if that’s explosive or something.”»
“Mice,” Jack said. “Are a real problem.”
“Yes, yes I know. That’s why I called you.”
“You did the right thing.” Jack was sounding more and more like a diabolical avenger. He had a low voice to begin with and it seemed to twitter and itch with excitement as we kept talking. Jack, unlike most people in my life, was not convinced I was a bit odd and obsessive, but rather pretty on board with my crazy. Which in turn, got me very fucking pumped to talk about diseases.
“Hey Jack,” I said, eager and confident now that I found a believer.
“What kind of diseases should I be worried about?”
“You might catch a virus, but you could catch the plague.”
“The plague? The for real plague, are you serious?”
“We don’t put that out there, you know, don’t want general public up in a panic, but since you asked I have an obligation. See, what most people don’t know is that rodents attract fleas, and these fleas cause the Bubonic Plague.”
“The Bubonic Plague?”
“Yes ma’am.”
Visions of anarchy, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse bringing death and destruction from my shitty kitchen in Park Slope across the Gowanus Canal, the East River, into Manhattan, Connecticut, the entire Eastern seaboard and then south, west, the entire country swallowed up in a wave of plague and death.
“I don’t believe you.” My roommate said putting the leash on her dog after storing a new bag of dog food under the sink. For the millionth time I told her all the reasons she shouldn’t be putting the dog food, unless sealed by a hard plastic shell, under the sink, namely the black death, but she just rolled her eyes. “So we’re going to get the Bubonic Plague? You, me, the dog, the lesbian chick in 1F? The guy down the hall who listens to shitty funk?”
“I just think it’s really important to continuously set traps and keep a really clean kitchen, ok? No more piles of paper or your weird shit everywhere. We don’t need this plastic duck on the counter do we? It doesn’t even light up.”
“The plastic duck can go the living room but I’m not throwing him out.” We sat there for a while looking at the dog. Then we heard the battle cry, the little scratching noises and the high shrills the mice make when they’re hungry. “Want to go get some dinner?” She said. “We can take the dog to that one place and sit outside. That place where it’s, you know, clean?”
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