Mouse Man

As I was talking to Jeff this afternoon, he informed me that a mouse just scurried across his foot. He was so very non-chalant about it. While I consider myself a very strong person, mentally and physically, I am not one to just sit around while mice run amok around me.

Jeff, on the other hand, actually seems to attract mice to his general vicinity. For, if you are in the athletic offices at Case, it is hard to believe that there are mice running around. There probably wasn't until Jeff got there! That's my theory anyways. These cleanly decorated walls, donning Lebron James and a retro Michael Jordan autograph would certainly not be a place that mice scamper and play.

This reminds me of several summers ago. Jeff was the director of a camp up in the Adirondack Mountains. He had to stay up there for six straight weeks. His options for sleeping were to stay in the bunks down by the lake, or to have his own lake house set back from where the campers were. Of course, he chose the lake house. The problem, the lake house hadn't been inhibited in quite some time. Cob webs, filth, spiders, and mice were very present inside that lake house. 

During the day, Jeff did not spend much time there. But in the evening, when all the campers were tucked away in their cabins, Jeff would return for probably a measly four hours of sleep. 

In that four hours, his sleep was always interrupted by a scrambling mouse or two. He said that he could often hear the pitter patter of their feet. Until one night, a mouse scurried across his forehead! I know for a fact that I would have jumped up, screamed, and ran out of that lake house to never return. And, I am not a dramatic person! What did Jeff do? Absolutely nothing. Didn't even try to swipe the thing off of his forehead. Claims he was too tired. I believe him, but feel as though that would have jump started me!

When I visited Jeff at camp, I made one-day trips at a time, not wanting to sleep in that mouse infested lake house. The one time I mustered up enough courage to sleep up there, I was awaken in the middle of the night. It felt like a mouse tip-toing across my forehead. At near freak out, I realized it was Jeff, tapping his fingers along my forehead to see what my reaction would be. 

Anyways, since Jeff made the move to Cleveland, there have been no mice in my life. But, not surprisingly, they are still present his mouse-magnitizing presence.