mouse cage, nessesities and extras (lucien l’aller)
Date: 2010-09-08, 7:31PM EDT
mouse cage(medium), house, wheel, bedding, food, timothy hay chews, treats, food bowl, salt and mineral licks. all free to good home. comes with albino male mouse
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Imagined subtext:
Yeah, I know you’re probably judging me. I’m not an idiot. I know how these things look to the outside eye. Hell, if I saw this ad eight months ago, I’d be thinking the same things you are. There I’d be, wrist-deep in a bag of Lay’s Dill Pickle flavored potato chips, feeling superior. I’d be thinking, “Dude, what’s wrong with you? Don’t you understand the concept of responsibility? Are you familiar with the term loyalty? Have you never heard of a little something called fucking commitment? Apparently, a little rodent’s too much trouble for you, you selfish prick. What are you gonna do when you have a wife? Kids? Are you gonna dump them, too? Put up a Craigslist ad? I see that ‘good home’ bullshit. Go ahead, try to mollify your guilt, but you’re not fooling anybody. Hey, asshole! Man up and take care of your mouse.”
I understand. I know how it sounds. But you don’t know me. You don’t know my mouse. And I doubt you know the word “mollify.” So don’t sit there and judge me.
Let me ask you something, Big Shot. Have you ever loved a creature so much that you would do anything for it? Have you? Have you ever risked getting bit and getting shit upon to hold that creature in the palm of your hand– the god damn palm of your hand– and whisper promises into its downy fur? Have you ever examined that creature under a powerful magnifying glass to ensure that it would not fall prey to mite infestation? Have you ever spent days exhaustively reading every thread in the forums at www.petportal.com/mouse-keeping/community/forums in an attempt to better understand your beloved’s habits and digestive system and needs? Have you?
Then you don’t know what it’s like to have your heart, still beating, gnawed at the edges. You don’t know what it’s like to have your heart bruised, trampled upon by tiny little mouse feet.
I treated Marcel like a king. I gave him everything, every material comfort a mouse could want. How many mouse-keepers do you know who go to the effort to install a small house in the middle of a cage? Most would say a cage is enough, wouldn’t they? Most would proudly stand back, hands on their hips like a super hero, and consider the job done. Most would quietly utter to themselves, “Well, that’s quite a cage. Now I will lift my mouse by the tail, dangle him over the top, and plop him down into his new home.”
I’ll tell you what, Chief. I’m not most. And you NEVER pick up a mouse by its tail! Think about doing that with Marcel, and I will show you how it feels when I pluck your ass up with one of those huge construction vehicles with steel pincers on the end.
I made Marcel a house. I know you’re asking yourself why. Mice have very sensitive eyes; they need a dark respite. Bring your albinos into that equation, and…well, I don’t throw around the phrase “potential eye damage” lightly.
I bet you didn’t know that, Cowboy.
Most people wouldn’t go out of their way to put a house in a cage, let alone build that house out of used popsicle sticks and non-toxic glue. Do you know how many popsicles I had to choke down to get those sticks? Thirty-seven. That’s four boxes, Mr. Know-it-all. Well, three full boxes, plus one from the fourth box. That leaves eleven unwrapped popsicles in my freezer. Popsicles that will remain, until the day I die, frozen reminders of my dedication to Marcel.
And yeah, okay, smart guy. I gotcha. I read you loud and clear, Boss. Yeah, sure, I could have let the popsicles melt. I didn’t need to eat them all. I’m sure you’re thinking it. I’m not an idiot. I thought it, too, but not until day three, on my 25th popsicle. And you know what? I finished the job. That’s the kind of guy I am. Even if I have to make my way through three plus boxes of nauseating root beer, banana, and lemon-lime popsicles, I’ll finish the job. Yeah, you heard me. Root beer, banana, and lemon-lime. I know. I’m with you on this one. There is no sensible reason for those three flavors to be in a box together. I mean, you see brown and creamy white on a package, you think chocolate and vanilla. But no. Tropical fruit, tropical fruit, carbonated beverage. It doesn’t make sense.
I’ll tell you what else doesn’t make sense. The fierce love a man has for his mouse.
Marcel had everything, a two story house with Palladian windows and a miniature balcony. A Silent Spinner wheel. And the bedding…
Listen, any half-assed mouse enthusiast can shred some old newspaper and throw it in a cage. Any cross-eyed, ten-year-old girl can chuck in a couple of wood chips, unwittingly putting her mouse at risk for respiratory problems. I’m talking bedding. Bedding. I’m talking a small hand-sewn sheet set and a fleece comforter. I’m talking little pillows embroidered with blue thistle. I’m talking two three-and-a-half by five-and-a-half-inch rectangles now missing from the lower left and right corners of my EasySleep All Cotton 700 threadcount bedlinen.
And hey, Professor, what do you know about Timothy hay? Do you know who likes it? Rabbits, chinchillas, Guinea pigs? Damn straight. The big boys. The heavy hitters of the rodent world. Most people, they don’t buy Timothy hay for a lowly little mouse. No, sir. But I’m different. I’m the type of guy that says, “Hey, buddy, whatever you need, I’ll get it for you.” That’s true when it comes to mice, and it’s true when it comes to friends. Marcel ticked both of those boxes.
I know what you’re thinking. “If Marcel was your friend, Jonathan, why did you try to train him? What are those ‘treats’ all about? Do you think you can just train your fucking friends with a block of cheese? Why couldn’t you just let Marcel be Marcel, man?”
Okay, two things. First of all, cheese is NOT GOOD for mice! You so much as show Marcel a picture of cheese and I will come to your house and stuff your newly empty eye sockets full of sharp white cheddar. Got it? Second of all, Marcel was Marcel, “man.” That was the problem.
Listen, we had good times. I’m not going to deny that. I wish I could. It would make this a hell of a lot easier, I’ll tell you that. Me and Marcel had a blast. Go ahead and Google “mouse” if you don’t believe me. See that Flickr photo on page nine? The one of the white mouse next to the Mac with the caption “CORDLESS MOUSE?” That’s him. That’s Marcel. He was a champ. He held still for two minutes while I got the angle and lighting right.
Yeah, I know. “If you and Marcel were such great friends, why aren’t you keeping him? Is that how you treat your friends? Just get rid of them, you self-centered dick wad? Just cast them aside, you lowlife sack of unreliable shit?”
FUCK YOU! Fuck YOU! Fuck your whole family!
Let me tell you something, Sherlock.
Marcel and I, we used to do this thing, the moon walk trick. I loved it, and I thought he did, too. One day, I take a close look at his little pink eyes, and you know what I see? I see familiarity. I see low level comprehension. I see reward-expectation. But what I don’t see is love. Most people, they probably wouldn’t notice. Or they’d just get another mouse, fucking move on. But I’m not most people. And I can’t live like that, knowing what’s missing, knowing what we don’t have.
There’s this German guy at work, Hans, always prattling on about something. He was talking about a book he was reading the other day, said he found out about it from “word of mouse.” Word of mouse. That’s what he said. And I got teary at the mental image of ten little Marcels lined up, squeakily passing the news from one adorably translucent ear to another. It was a full three seconds before I realized Hans said “word of mouth.”
So, Wise Guy, do you still think I don’t care about Marcel? Do you still think this is fucking easy for me? Do you think German people should try harder not to have retarded accents that confuse people and get their emotions all stirred up?
Look. What I’m saying here is, I have mouse stuff. You can just take it. And take Marcel, while you’re at it. Maybe he’ll be happier with you. The least I can do is give him that chance. You can have him. You can have everything.
Everything but the tiny tuxedo outfit. You don’t know how difficult it was to make a monocle that small. Fuck.
Tags: albino, bedding, cage, food, food bowl, good home, lucien l'aller, male mouse, montreal, mouse, mouse house, nessesities, timothy hay, wheel
