Personal Blogs

I live in a hundred-odd year old cottage in a school playground. It used to be a tied house, as part of my job I had to live there. Then it became a regular council house.

Hundred year old cottages in school playgrounds come with some problems: they cost a fortune to heat, people think that they have the right to knock on your door at all hours and you have to put up with sharing your house with animals.

My wife and I both grew up in houses like this so we're kind off easy-osy about the animals. But things sometime go to far and you have to call in exterminators.

And having some cheeky mice sods nesting in the pot-pourri on your living room table is definitely too far. The first we realized was when what seemed like a million tiny rodents started scattering themselves everywhere.

I'll give you a heads-up, nothing you can buy as a regular Joe is going to remove the wee beggars, you need to call in the professionals. And by professionals I mean a small independent bod who knows what they are about.

The guy that we use is a chirpy-chappy who likes to chat about his job. I like chatting to workmen about what they are doing, it's how you learn.

Today we bemoaned the change in bin collection times, discussed the fact that the bait the the council uses hasn't been eaten by Edinburgh mice for years...

Yes, that's what I said. Mice seem to have a genetic memory as to what killed their ancestors. They stop eating bait. [Which is why the stuff that they sell in shops is rubbish.]

"What bait did I use last time? Aniseed or chocolate?" I couldn't remember. Notice it was the flavour that we were interested in, not the type of bait, that has changed.

"I'll use the gel anyway..."

A decent exterminator can tell where the mice-runs are, heck even I can, I've talked to enough of them over the years. I know the signs.

So the gel gets applied to the 'squeeze pints', it gets onto the mouse, which cleans it off rather like a cat would clean it off.

The house will be clear by next week.