Polly the cat is doing what she's supposed to do - kill off rodents. 

Unfortunately she's not killing off the rodents we wanted her to, ie the moles that are terrorizing our lawn.  In the past month we've lost one hamster to her and tonight we lost Bert the mouse.

I couldn't sleep, so I was laying in bed watching Matchstick Men.  Polly was laying next to me purring...and out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of white movement and before I knew it the cat was up out of the bed and on it.  I knew what it was immediately...mice are masters of escape and Bert's got out before.  I had to wake up my husband to look under the bed and comfirm that it was indeed Bert (can't bend) -and it was.

Polly was apparently pretty proud of her catch because I had to chase her around the house to get her to give him up.  I finally caught her in the kitchen, swinging poor Bert's corpse around and batting it across the floor.  (It was a good thing I came in here too; she'd been in my embroidery floss box and had unravelled two skeins all over the living room).  I separated her from what was left of Bert and disposed of him properly.  She's now perched on the back of the couch, giving me the kitty evil eye and flicking her tail from side to side like she's mad.

My kids are getting quite accustomed to pet deaths lately, and I don't think it's a good thing.  I'm not replacing Bert the mouse or Pumpkin the hamster...I think that would be giving my kids the message that pets are disposable and replaceable, and I don't want them to have that attitude towards animals.

So tomorrow morning we'll no doubt have a mousey memorial service where we'll all try to say something nice about Bert.  Jake will cry, and Davey will make fun of him, and life will go on.

But we'll have to be more aware that we have an assasin in our midst.....