Canto LXI

Well, it's late friday afternoon, I'm tired of this calculation and I need a distraction. To the Blog! Also, a bunch of guys around the office with whom I would normally be killing time with went to a day conference down in Providence, RI. I would have liked to go, but sadly I had to teach the ungrateful freshman today. They suck. I think I spend most of my time now complaining about them... Oh well, it makes me feel better.

Something I've been meaning to blog about, not so much from a good-news standpoint, but well, it's something new that's happened to us. And near as we can tell has a happy ending (so far, anyway). A couple weeks ago we started to notice some signs of mice. Things had gotten a little messy, probably enough crumbs and junk on the counter and floor for one of those little fuckers to scrape by. Also, it was starting to get cold so they were probably looking for some place warm to live after the summer. Anyway, after we noticed we cleaned up a little bit so they wouldn't have anything to eat and informed the landlord. When we first moved in I noticed some very old mouse traps (the sticky kind) under the oven, so I know that this would not be too surprising. And he said he would lay down some traps in the basement to catch the bastards, which I presume he did (although we have no verification to that effect). Anyway, we continued to see signs of mice for another week plus. Those little rat bastards. So at that point what to do? This sunday while shopping, we bought our own pair of mouse traps. After we got home, we cleared off everything from the kitchen counter, plus all the lower cabinets and drawers where we could see any possible signs of mice and moved them out. Then baited the traps with some peanut butter and left them out over night. I know people talk about building a better mouse trap, but why? I mean, the ones we have seem to work pretty well. I didn't think we were going to catch anything since these mouse traps must suck so much that we constantly need better ones, but then again, I'm not as dumb as a mouse. [My parents or brother should feel free to post about me and mouse traps at a younger age.] But sure enough, next morning, we had caught a mouse! And by caught, I mean broke it's spine with a steel spring and bar, because it was most assuredly dead by the time we found it. After the morning shower, I played a little something from The Doors In Concert.

I always feel that music should reflect the moments in life. Anyway, it's been 5 days since then and nary a mouse dropping to be found! I think that if there was more than one, they are now sufficiently scared of the hand of man.

I should note that I did feel some smug sense of power after this incident. I never "got" hunting until this monday morning. I'm not saying I'm going to go out and get a rifle to kill Bambi's mom or anything, but there is some thrill in vanquishing an opponent. Even a significantly lesser foe with no real ability to fight back.

On a happier note, a friend here in the CTP is teaching this fall, and in his class is one of the program managers for MIT Radio (WMBR - 88.1 FM). So we may start a 2 hour radio show once a week, along with some other friends of ours. My friend did one in college with a buddy and said it was great. I don't know what this would involve just yet, but sounds like a lot of fun. From 2-4 AM, which is apparently the kind of time slot we would receive. I've thought about doing this before, so here's my big chance before I die. My idea is to have a theme for each show, and play about 10-15 songs based on that theme, then talk about whatever related to that subject. Think High Fidelity, like playing the Top 5 songs involving dogs, for example. Then play things like 'Martha My Dear' by The Beatles (supposedly about Paul's dog), 'My Dog Was Lost But Now He's Found' by The Fiery Furnaces, Given The Dog A Bone by AC/DC, etc... It could get more or less obscure depending on how things roll. But you get the idea. Does that sound like a program you would listen to for a while? If so, do you have suggestions for themes and accompanying songs? This would probably start up after the terms over, either December or January.