Did I mention that Jackie is perhaps the greatest mouser EVER? This morning featured what was almost a double, uhh, muricide: a dead mouse in the hall, and a live one she had cornered in one of my husband’s shoes.

I took the shoe outside and put it on its side, in the hopes that the hapless rodent would come out and run away. No luck. I put some unidentified seeds (no doubt from some previous macrobiotic roommate) at the ankle hole of the shoe, but that didn’t lure it out either — not that I could blame it. Finally, I put out a little blob of peanut butter (because everybody likes peanut butter) on a small rock just outside the shoecave and left for a while. When I came back, the shoe was free of its very own rodent infestation and the peanut butter blob was gone. I hope the mouse ate it all as a sort of celebration of having come through a brush with death.

Jackie of course got full credit for having caught two mice, including treats, pets, praise, and a mouse stamp on the calendar (unfortunately, they won’t really stick to her bowl). As previously mentioned, it is my hope that eventually, the mice will just stop coming in. In the meantime, I feel bad for the poor little things, but I don’t feel bad for being hantavirus-free.

Oh yeah: jury duty. Except now I live in a much teensier county, and they don’t give jurors anything like a questionnaire to fill out and send back, so I can’t offer my trademark, “I have a Ph.D. in political theory and I double-dog dare you to call me” and save myself a trip. I reckon I’ll just show up and promptly get tossed out on my over-educated butt as usual. At least the drive to Georgetown and back is pretty, and it’s entirely possible to park there.

For those of you just joining us, I get called for jury duty ALL THE FRICKIN’ TIME, and despite the fact that I have always wanted to serve on a jury, they never, ever, ever pick me as soon as they learn my terrible secret. So basically, it just wastes my time and makes me even more cynical about the juridical system.

In other news, I got married again last month. Yeah, I know. My single life: blink and you’ll miss it. It was a really cool Buddhist ceremony performed by a former rockstar student of mine (although technically, he’s really more of a folk/bluegrass/Celtic star). I wore purple, because really, who am I kidding? It was also really fun. I can certainly provide more details on that if you’re interested, dear reader.

One of the many things we did to save money was to buy all the booze for the bar. It’s probably going to take us until our first anniversary or longer to get through the leftovers. Said leftovers — including a few cases of wine — are stashed in the garage, which is at the lowest point of the hill-perched house. This of course has led me to refer to the garage as “the wine cellar.” It’s so much classier than “booze-infested garage.”