Of mice and men

I attribute this post to my friend Jessica who reminded me that I have a blog (thanks Jess!).

I haven't had much time to write about the small details of my life out here, mainly because there is not enough space, and I'm not sure how much the internet wants to know about the musings of a 20-something year old grad student.

Aside from well, lots of things, two things have been occupying significant slices of my time: Mice and men (Steinbeck would be proud). Yes, mice and men. Two things that look cute and nice, but are pests once they infiltrate your life.

Of mice:

To preface this section, my apartment is a great deal. It is cheap for the Boston area and my room is huge. I also am conveniently located by the church, two T stops, a grocery store, and a running trail. It really is a good spot. Except for one large downside.

The downside: we had mice. Lots of mice. I wake up every day to new mouse droppings on the floor in the kitchen and on the stove. For a while during the winter, I would wake up to the sounds of gnawing against the walls, and I would find 2-inch (I am not exaggerating here) sized holes in my bedroom from the mice. I immediately thought of Hanta virus and imagined me dying in the hospital from a Hanta respiratory infection. I also found droppings in the kitchen and living room. This was not good, so I bleached, not just cleaned, the apartment every time the mice came in. I bleached every day for two months before I headed out to class and work. And my roommates at the time apparently didn't know what mouse droppings look like (who doesn't know what mouse droppings look like?!), so I was the only one doing any cleaning. Did I mention that my roommates and I never leave food out, so I don't know what the mice were eating.

My room was also the only room the mice consistently invaded. They found their way into my winter clothing, so I had to throw out my winter hats, scarves, gloves, and several other pieces of clothing that mice decided tasted good. This was bad timing, since the winter this year was particularly harsh. The mice also got into my makeup, toothbrush, towels, and sheets. All of which I had to replace. And no matter how many times I patched the holes, the mice kept coming back.

I was at my wit's end. I imagined stealing arsenic from the lab, lacing cakes with it, and feeding it to the mice. I imagined ripping a hole in the apartment wall and piping poisonous gas into the walls. I thought about borrowing a cat and letting it hunt the mice to extinction. I even built my own mousetraps in an attempt to make better ones. I was a lone soldier engaged in a battle royale with those furry invaders. I wanted to call in head-hunters, Amazonian warriors, ninjas, even pirates. Anything or anyone with a license to kill would have been welcome in my home.

After much goading, photographic evidence, research into Boston's tenant rights, and a series of well-worded emails, the managers finally responded. They put down traps, set out poison, and patched holes in the wall. I caught 5 mice in one month. The tenants downstairs caught 17.

The frequency of murine appearances has since decreased, but I still find occasional mouse droppings, and I still wake up at night when I hear the slightest sounds. I blame some of my poorer grades on the fact that the mice woke me up several times a night this semester.

And so the war continues.

Of men:

What do single women think about when they are not thinking about school, work, church, money, friends, careers, keeping a mouse-ridden house clean, travel, stocks/investing strategy (maybe that's just me), clothes, books, chocolate, a cute niece that calls you on the phone, surfing (maybe that's just me again), and food?

Men. We think about men.

I've had the blessing and curse of meeting a lot of different people in my life. Some are good, some are bad, most are somewhere in-between. For some reason, I expected LDS people to be somewhat less shallow than non-LDS people. I am so wrong. There are LDS people, particularly a certain man, that are just as shallow as non-LDS people. And some of them are so blatantly shallow that I may have called one of them out on it. Ok, so I did call someone out on it. I can't help it. My mouth just spurts things out and I have no control. Even I am surprised by what I say. Just so you know, the parts of this entry that seem angry are inspired by a recent unfortunate conversation with a ridiculous person, who I can't stand, that shall remain unnamed.

The point here is that both men and women, regardless of religious status, can be really shallow. But for some reason, it's so much worse to meet an LDS person that is shallow and sex-obsessed then a non-LDS person of the same... caliber. My initial reaction to such distasteful conversation is: If you're thinking about it that much then just take off, do it, and leave us (meaning me) alone. For some reason, I expect LDS people to know that relationships are about more than what a person looks like and how good they would be in bed. I'm not saying that looks aren't a part of the whole dating thing, but I am sick of people, both LDS and non-LDS, basing important decisions on bad criteria, and also making things harder than they need to be. I am sick of people requiring convenient relationships. (Just so you know, I don't hate LDS people. I just hate it when people are shallow.)

So, if you ask me if I am going out with any LDS men, I would say, not really. Mainly because numbers are not on my side - there are twice as many women as there are men in this area. This is true of the LDS church in all areas outside of Utah/Arizona/Idaho belt.

However, I go on more dates with guys outside the church than guys in the church. They are attractive, intelligent guys that actually want to know who I am. They are interested in what I think. They have interesting things to say. They are funny. They are complimentary. They are capable of holding both conversation and eye contact. They like trying new things. They don't say stupid things about my aura. And I feel like I can be open about my crazy life without feeling like I'm being judged for not having a perfect family or a dad that's not a stake president or evaluated on some other crazy criteria.

And most importantly, they are open to having a real relationship and are willing to work for it.

This is great in terms of getting to know people. But this is bad if you want a temple marriage.

There is a possibility that one really good non-LDS man may be hanging around longer than I thought he would.

I am at war with myself over this. I don't know if or how long he's going to stay. I don't even know if I want him to stay. But I am glad that I know him. And that's enough for now.

I'm not sure if Steinbeck and Burns knew how true they were when they wrote that "the best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry." Between the mice and men, my plans have definitely gone awry. At this point I can hardly see beyond my nose.

This should be an interesting summer.