This year has been pretty intense and crazy. I started out by having my ACL replaced, then decided to move to Salt Lake, starting dating a guy, moved my office to Salt Lake, got dumped, moved my personal stuff into my office, got the Orem house ready to sell, went to Europe, and now finally moved myself to Salt Lake. Did you notice that moving was in there a lot? Yeah, me too. I started packing up my things in May and just now, 5 months later, have most of my stuff situated in my new house.
I found a cute and quaint place in June, but after talking to the landlord decided that I would move into the unit he was finishing next door. He said it should be ready by mid July. By the end of July he said the end of August. By the end of August he said the first of October and then I promptly gave up. I looked for new places as soon as I got back from Europe (the one silver-lining of that place taking forever is that I used my rent money to go to Europe for two weeks by myself), found one on a Friday, saw it Saturday morning, and started moving in Saturday afternoon.
This seemed like a match made in heaven. It was the quickest apartment search ever and it had everything I wanted. It is recently remodeled, within walking distance of Trader Joe's and Williams and Sonoma, close to my office, has more than enough living space, a pantry, washer and dryer hookups, a bathtub and new appliances. (the photos below are the new place)
Then I moved.
My U-haul had so many problems that they ended up refunding everything but my mileage.
The previous tenants stopped paying their gas bill so it had been turned weeks before I moved in, so no showers, cooking or laundry for the first 5 days...
Then my neighbor introduced herself. She asked how much I wanted to know about the previous tenants and before I could answer she plopped down on my couch and opened the floodgates about how the guy was a tatted-up gang member who manufactured and sold drugs and the girlfriend only entered the house by climbing through the kitchen window. After she left, I had to check my house for signs of meth... something I never thought I would have to do.
After getting over the shock of living in a drug dealer's house and being assured (well half way, he is not a very assuring type) by my landlord that they did not cook meth I moved in, but so did the mice.
I saw the first lying in the middle of my floor; he was very much dead. He was surprisingly cute and pretty tiny, gross yes, but not the most alarming thing. A day or so later I found his friend hiding in my laundry room. Naturally, I put on rainboots, grabbed a trashcan (to catch him in if it came to that) and stood at my cracked door until my friend could bring me some traps. After setting it up we sat down to talk. Then, the mouse decided to venture out. After our initial shock, we were determined to get it out. He conveniently ran into a pile of moving boxes and got trapped. Once that happened we were able to make a box exit for him and my friend literally kicked him out the front door.
I texted my landlord that night and he said that he would get an exterminator. Four days and five huge bait stations later my house was ready for the mice. The bait takes at least 10 days to kill mice so I had to wait. I had to wait through the nights where I would bolt up in my bed because I could hear them in my walls. I had to keep all food stored. I had to vacuum up their poop. But, it seemed like they were going away.
Then last week I did a load of laundry and noticed dropping again. I grabbed the vacuum and went room to room and sure enough there was poop in EVERY room. As I went to grab my shoes--that were on a shoe rack a couple rows up--I found poop. POOP IN MY SHOE! I texted my landlord and he only texted me back after my second attempt the next day saying this was a huge deal (he has a track record for telling me things like, "a mouse here and there isn't a big deal" and when asked if he would fix a baseball size hole behind my oven that I realized mice used as a door he said "no, holes don't attract mice." He is an idiot). An exterminator came out yesterday but the bait isn't working. The mice are getting food from somewhere so they are not interested in the bait and won't until the food disappears. I have never found droppings on my counter and my food has never been touched so they are obviously going elsewhere. The only thing that we can think of is that they are eating at the neighbors (I live in a duplex) and then they just come to my house to poop and party. I can't decide if I should be flattered or not.
So, I basically am living with mice until my landlord hires a contractor to fill in all the gaps from the outside, fixes my unfinished pantry where the plywood floor opens to the creepy stairs that go to the dirt basement (the mice are literally walking up the stairs and straight into my pantry, they don't even have to try with how ill-fitting that plywood "door/floor" is). I am loosing faith in my landlord but the bigger problem is that it is getting cold and if this isn't fixed the mice will not leave until spring, so if he can't get his act together I need to move.
Moving in my least favorite thing.
Also, I have already totally moved in, had friends instal Ikea shelving (which equals me driving to Ikea no less than 7 times to buy the correct shelves...) bought furniture solely because it fits in this house, and spent DAYS organizing. If i have to move I will require that my landlord lets me kick him in the shins on the way out.
I can tell mice have been in my house because they poop, how awful would it be if that's how I identified my friends or family coming to visit? Thank you for never pooping on my floor or behind my appliances, I mean it from the bottom of my heart.