We have mice (and other random notes)

[sinanju]

Haven't written much in my livejournal lately. Haven't had much to say or much urge to say it. Now I have.

We have mice. How do I know this? I was in the bathroom last night preparing for bed when I first heard the soft skittering of tiny feet on the floor and then, turning, caught a glimpse of something small and gray vanishing under the door. Mice. Well, better than roaches. Mice are annoying, but roaches are vile beyond description. The only real surprise is that we've got mice now. We've had them before, but usually they're nowhere to be seen in the summer months. Time to buy some new bait stations and give them a rude and lethal surprise.

I dreamed that snippy and I were standing in our bedroom (in the dream-logic sense of "our bedroom", of course; it bore no resemblance to our real bedroom). Suddenly, from behind something big--a desk or the back of a dresser or something, though it was sitting a couple of feet out from the wall, a light comes a-flickering. It was like the way a lamp with a short in the cord will flicker. We moved around to look. The light was coming from no visible source, flaring and flickering in the air at floor level in the corner of the room.

Oh swell, I thought in my dream, we've got poltergeists. (This dream had nothing to do with discovering that we've got mice just before I went to bed, I'm certain....) Not satisfied with spooky light displays, the poltergeists went to Defcon 2 and the wall next to us began to swell and move. I'd had enough. Stepping forward I decided to confront the poltergeists and order them to cease and desist, certain that if I could be firm enough I would win the resulting battle of wills and they'd find themselves tossed on their intangible little butts.

I shouted, "Stop!" Well...I tried. It actually came out in a strangled little whisper. So I tried harder, and then once more. And that's when I woke up to hear myself whisper--just barely audibly--"stop!" Hmmm. Apparently I was fighting sleep paralysis hard enough to wake myself up. Just as well, I suppose. I doubt snippy would have appreciated being awakened by me shouting "Stop!" in the middle of the night.

I'm bored with all my usual lunch spots. So today I tried Chicken Vindaloo from the Indian lunchwagon parked near our office. "HOT and SPICY chicken in a garlic-based sauce" with chunks of potato and basmatic rice (whatever the hell that is), according to the menu. And snippy mocks me for not being adventurous in my eating....

Well, okay, it's a fair cop. I know what I like and I like what I know. I'd also be a lousy traveler for similar reasons. But I was bored and desperate (if you can be bored and desperate simultaneously), so I tried it. It was okay. I liked the pieces of chicken, which were fairly large but cooked thoroughly enough that they would separate when I poked them with the plastic fork. The potatos were fine. I liked the rice. The sauce was okay, and not too hot, and initially I enjoyed it. Toward the end of the meal, though, I suddenly realized I didn't want any more. The vindaloo has some faint flavor I don't like; it isn't evident in any particular bite, but it builds up and suddenly reaches a threshold of awareness and I don't like it.

So I probably won't try the vindaloo again. Might try some of the other dishes at the lunchwagon, though. Eventually. Right now I'm thinking about dinner. As in, what we'll do about it. Twoson is back with us, visiting for a few days after moving into his father's place. So we can't just go home and scrounge something up. We have to produce a meal, see. He expects no less. Trouble is, I have less than no interest in cooking anything tonight. Maybe I can persuade snippy make dinner tonight. Or, failing that, maybe I'll order a pizza.