Splitting Day and Who Can Build a Better Mousetrap

Splitting day started at 6:30am as Shannon and Bill prepped to split a very large pile of very large wood pieces. 

Shannon spent time during the year cutting and collecting. The wood piled against the marketplace did not look like much and Shannon thought they would be finished by lunchtime. Hah! It was a solid six hours of splitting, carting and piling to complete it but Shannon is not going to freeze this winter.  

Tomorrow at the same time they will be driving to Annapolis Royal to return the splitter. Then onto the next job.

Apparently people in this area have been really bothered by rodents this year. Shannon has tried a variety of traps with the biggest complaint being that not only does she not catch the mice but they steal the traps. Before we got to her house she was experimenting with a bucket filled with an antifreeze mixture, a stick, a pipe and peanut butter. She had some luck but the mice seemed to learn from the fate of their friends and success wore off. Bill shared his friend Bill Wiley’s improvements on this strategy, adding a string and a can to the mix. No luck. They then bought new traps and screwed them to the floor. Bill changed the bait to banana slices because everyone knows that banana and peanut butter goes together. No luck. Next they decided to go back to the old type trap but put it in a place where they knew the mice were the day before. The next five minutes were filled with the sound of snap..snap..snap. Catching mice? No! More like catching fingers as they tried to get the traps set. Tomorrow morning will test the success level, but I’m not holding my breath.

Sandy (this will be my last blog for this trip as we are returning to our plague infested home province).