Mouse LIII

Mouse 52. Yawn. Yawn. I was becoming immune to the horror of it all - the intermittent but ongoing maiming and killing of rodentia. Then came mouse number 53. He was small and gray with big black eyes, rounded ears and a sad little twitchy nose. I met him last weekend when he tried to "hide" by my foot in the basement. He ran away before I could catch him. And he was very cute.

Monday night I found him on the basement floor, near death. We don't put out poison, so I can only surmise that his impending demise was the result of disease or insufficient food supplies. I picked him up with a gloved hand. He breathed out a labored breath and tried to arch his back. I carried him up to show the girls and then took him outside near the compost heap. If he has enough energy to forage for food, he won't need to forage far. I don't think he's going to make it though, poor thing.

Sometime ago one of the ropes broke in a double hung window of our dining room. I took both the upper and lower sashes out (quite honestly, I think just to see if I could). But so long as they are out...

One of the things that really bothers me is the painted woodwork in our dining room. The original owners were very careful about how they choose the flooring for their house. The used oak flooring in the public spaces of the house (the entryway, the living room, and the dining rooms) and "cheap" yellow birch flooring everywhere else. The trim and woodwork in the entryway and the living room are stained oak. The trim and woodwork in the dining room though is painted white. It doesn't match. I have always wanted to strip the paint off the woodwork in the dining room and stain it to match the oak floors and the entryway/living room woodwork. It's funny how one small cotton rope breaking was all that I needed to convince myself (and my wife) that the windows needed a complete overhaul, including the window trim.

The problem is that having windows disassembled in winter leaves a gaping hole. Even in our case, where I have the storms on, a single pane of glass isn't nearly as good as two, which means the race is on to get the window put back together, along with the all of the trim I pulled off. In the interest of getting the job down quickly, I took all the window trim (about 100 linear feet of it) to a local paint stripping place. If people have any experience with prices, please let me know. This place charges $1.80 per linear foot for any piece that is 6" or less in width. And another $2.20 on top of that to finish. That was a little more than I was expecting.

The upshot is that in three or four weeks, I should have the window trim ready to be stained and varnished.