V for Vendetta. M for Mousie.

I have a new roommate. Like most, an unwanted roommate who 1. doesn't pay rent and 2. leaves his shit (literally) all over the place.

My new roommate is a mouse, and he has some serious issues with me.

Now, I understand that the cold weather just started and I live in an apartment building in New York City. Mice happen and I can live with that. What I cannot live with is when the little fucker comes into my bedroom--yes, you heard me right. he came into my bedroom--TWO nights in a row at 5:00AM and woke me up. He was rustling through my little file cabinet, apparently going through some of my old tax forms. It remains to be seen if the IRS will now be auditing me. When i turned on the light, he just sat there and looked at me. I have a feeling that if he could have, he totally would have flipped me the bird. There was some serious bad feeling I was getting from him.

I think I know why: when I first noticed the mouse, it was approximately 9pm on a weeknight and I was home watching some TV. The little bugger ran across the wall of my living room and hopped through the unbelievably small crack where the radiator pipe was. Fine. That weekend I got some steel wool and plugged up the hole. With mousie not in there, I guess. So now he's pissed at me and is trying to make my life hell.

So after being woken up at 5:00AM two days in a row, I decided to bust out the big guns and put out some glue traps. Yes, yes, they are totally gross and inhumane, but less bloody than a snap trap (which doesn't always kill instantly either), and more effective than the no-see-um hockey puck traps I got.

Well, 3 days later and I still haven't caught him. I think he suspects something b/c I haven't heard a peep from him. I still wake up in the middle of the night, but that's my own paranoia and/or heavy drinking that is the cause. My mom just got into town, so I explained the whole situation to her, in case the mouse's vendetta is automatically transferred to my family members. And this was the conversation that ensued:

Mom: What kind of bait are you using for the traps?

FC: Peanut butter. Chunky kind.

Mom: Oh no, that won't do. New York City mice prefer bacon.

FC: WTF? How the hell do you know they like bacon?

Mom: I've lived in NYC for years so I know this. Minnesotan mice are like country mice and they like peanut butter. But NYC mice want something better.

FC: I don't believe you. (sarcastically) Do they like the thick cut, non-fatty bacon the best?

Mom: Yes. I'll pick some up tomorrow. You'll see. I'll catch that mouse.


No lie. This is the conversation I had with my mother.

I'll keep you updated on whether or not the bacon traps work...

BUSTED! in the Land of 10,000 Lakes: REDUX

So remember that police bust in MN? Well, turns out my friend's tenant upstairs has been busted this time:

Mitchell law standout charged in visa scheme

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/15783872.htm

Apparently, he was pretending to be a congressman and getting U.S. visas for his family in Cameroon. Totally sketchy. But a little more white collar than say dealing crystal meth, right? Then again, nine counts of fraud in federal court isn't so great either...

Track Nyack: My life as a checkpoint girl

Dirty recently hosted a bike race. I was selected as one of the check point girls. Now, fixed gear and track bikes are not my thing. I play no part in that subculture. I don't even know how to ride a damn bike.

Luckily, this was not a required skill for running a checkpoint.

Sure, it sounds fun: People in teams of two get on their bikes and ride as quickly as they can to the checkpoint in Central Park, eat a Devil Dog as fast as they can and then ride off to some bike track in Queens. No sweat. Riiiiight. I do not participate in competitive sports and I guess it brings out the worst in people sometimes. We were not exactly prepared for it. Some nasty bastards came through. And quite a few vegans. We tried to convince them that there were no animal products in a Devil Dog. It's probably all synthetic or some variation of high fructose corn syrup. But some very nice racers also came through also. Usually they were the ones who had no chance of winning. They would sit down and chat with us. And in the end, we didn't even find out who won since they still had another hour or so of riding.



There was a lot of thrown up Devil Dog around the checkpoint area. The squirrels and rats probably had a feast that night. Gross.



It was a good time, but I think next year's check point will rock even more. I may consider bringing a baseball bat next time too.

BUSTED! in the Land of 10,000 Lakes

I recently went back to my beloved home state of MN for a conference. What better way to visit than on work's dime!

After a two-night stay at the downtown Minneapolis Hilton, and two days of an extremely boring conference where everyone there seemed to contribute to our nation's obesity epidemic by drinking way too much soda (one girl there drank three cans of coke before 8:30am!), I made my way to the sweeter of the Twin Cities, my hometown of St. Paul.

That's when things started to get interesting. The first evening I think I saw enough people I went to high school with to qualify as a high school reunion. It isn't quite as frightening to me as it used to be and everyone generally seems much nicer (and less sober) than they did back in the day. Some people also have children that are over 10 years old. Very disturbing. I also met some dude who used to live up the block from me. His nickname is "Tuffy." Enough said.

I was staying with a friend of mine and the next morning I wake up to get some water. I hear all of these voices, which is strange since my friend had said she had a conference call from home that morning. I thought the voices were really loud for a conference call, but maybe my friend is going deaf and had the volume on high. So I walk into the dining room and there are like 6 people sitting at her table. Definitely not a conference call. And most of the people sitting were in S.W.A.T. gear with POLICE written across the front. We thought it was a drug bust (my friend has tenants living upstairs and you never know when people might be running a meth lab in their apartment.) Well, turns out to be Immigration & Customs Enforcement coming for her upstair tenant's cousin. The tenant is a political asylee from Cameroon who's in law school. He's here legitimately. We're not sure about the cousin but supposedly he's here legitimately also. But they still took him away in cuffs. Everyone was in their pajamas (not the cops) and they almost took him away without shoes. Rude. At this point, he is still being detained and may possibly be deported. It's very scary what limited rights immigrants have here.

I am sure the police thought it was interesting that not only did my friend have two African refugees in her house, but then some Asian girl walks in during the bust. They didn't even ask me for my ID.

Needless to say, I am glad I didn't get deported. Although I am not sure where they would deport me to since I am U.S. citizen...