Margaret Suran wrote:
>
> Melba's Jammin' wrote:
> > In article >, Blair P.
> > Houghton > wrote:
> >
> >
> >>I had a mouse.
> >
> >
> > (hilarious story snipped)
> >
> >
> >>But, curious like any cat, I wanted to see my prey.
> >>So I grabbed a handy (dirty) 1-quart pyrex measuring
> >>cup, and a heavy book (The Art of Eating, by MFK Fisher).
> >>I placed the book over the cup, save an inch for the mouth
> >>of the trap. I opened the trap. In the same motion, the
> >>mouse fell from the trap, turned, and leapt out through the
> >>tiny space remaining. He caromed off the toaster oven,
> >>flew to the floor, tried the trash can as a hiding spot,
> >>found no opening underneath, then turned and made for
> >>the refrigerator. Total time to escape to invisibility:
> >>about 0.7 seconds.
> >
> >
> > "Oh, what fools these mortals be."
> >
> >
> >>Maybe the rabbits will adopt him before the snakes and
> >>coyotes do.
> >
> >
> > Or maybe not.
> > "Here, kittykitty; here, kittykitty."
>
> I had a mouse. I saw it on Friday and told the Handyman to come and do
> something. He put out several glue traps and the next day, yesterday, I
> found its corpse.
>
> I hope that this was the only one. Tandoora, my cat, acted like a true
> feline, at least an apartment kitty: As long as she suspected there
> might be a mouse in the kitchen, she hid in my bedroom.
>
> Barbara, remember the sound you heard while you were here? Maybe it was
> the mouse and not the alarm in the radiator or in the smoke alarm.
> Debbie heard it, too, but now it is gone.
>
> I live on the 20th floor of an apartment building. Exterminators come
> every week to make sure that no kind of creepy crawly things live in the
> building, yet I have had mice several times before. At those times, I
> had three cats living with me. The cats would actually catch the mouse,
> play with it for a while and then let it go. Not once did one of them
> kill a mouse.
>
> This morning, I called one of the building's porters, to check on the
> traps that are still here. They were empty and I hope that they stay
> that way. Tandoora is still staying out of the kitchen.
>
> Happy New Year, Margaret

Tandoora is probably afraid of the mouse traps more than the mice.

There is a standard method to keep cats off selected places. Get half a dozen
small mouse traps. Arm them and set them _FACE DOWN_ (very carefully of
course) on whatever surface you want to keep cats off. Cover with a newspaper.
The cat will go to that spot once and never more. The traps will not harm the
cat when they trigger.

My daughter just had a baby. The cat took a liking for the crib when the baby
was not there. After having to wash the crib linens once too many times we did
just what I described. No more cat problems.

Bert