Locomotoring

Misadventures that come from night sky observation from home….

The house is dark, camera is focusing on distant sky, we are peering into the laptop screen. Suddenly I hear the hoot of an owl. I have a life list going on in my Merlin app, it attempts to list the birds in my backyard. So I open up the kitchen garden door to record. I am excited that Merlin identifies it as a great horned owl. What I didn’t realize is that the owl had scared a mouse right into our kitchen.

The mouse in a biscuit tin is homage to one of my favorite Fawlty Tower episodes, Basil The Rat. How I actually realized is from the telltale mouse poop. To confirm we got our Nest camera to record the kitchen overnight. This mouse is spectacularly cute with its big ears. It is active all night long, exploring, exploring, … up and down, up and down. My kitchen is clean, there are no random morsels of food lying around. So it is having to explore really hard.

I am sad. Taking a life is hard, even if they are a pest and have no reason to be in your home.And I am sorry, if it weren’t for my curiosity, it might not have had to die.