Front Porch Gift

I've been wanting to write for a few days. I have a couple of blogs in my head, but don't ever seem to find the time to write about what I'm thinking. The big news of the day is a winter storm that is suppose to be coming tonight into tomorrow. We may be snowed in again, so hang around, for more stories about that.
I've been wanting to write about a little gift that a stray neighborhood cat has left at the foot of the stairs going up to our front door. He has actually brought us 2 gifts in a couple days span. I guess the cat really likes us, to bring us such fine gifts. One is a mangled bird and the other one, my favorite, a dead mouse. Some of you may not know the ultimate fear I have of mice. I am so scared of the little varmints. I know, it's so silly to be so scared of a little mouse, which I'm 1000 times larger than, and I know they are more scared of me than I am of them (I doubt that) and I know they can't hurt me (except from the diseases they like to carry), I know all these things, let me tell you, it DOESN'T help!
I have to share the story about my apartment in Nashville. I was fresh out of college (by 2 days) and had planned on moving to Nashville, in hope of a career in my field of study. I had gotten a cute little apartment, that I was SO proud of. I felt like Mary Tyler Moore, I was going to make it on my own. The whole experience made me grow up. I had never been fully on my own before, and with friends and family 5-8 hours away, I didn't have a choice. Well, one night after work, I got home into my apartment. It was almost 11pm and I had come in and started reading my mail, when I heard something in the kitchen. I froze, I was scared someone was in there. I didn't know what to do, so I did the only logical thing...I took off my shoe, ready to attack someone or something with force. I went around the corner and saw nothing. I was standing there dumbfounded, knowing that I had heard SOMETHING. As I stood there, I all of a sudden see the empty pizza box that was on my counter, start to move. I about flipped out! I thought it was a big roach or something (which wouldn't have bothered me), then all of a sudden a mouse shot out of the box and ran behind my refrigerator. I wouldn't have been at all surprised if I would have wet myself, right then and there. (The shear thought about the mice are making me shiver, while I'm writing this!) Anyway, I didn't know what I should do. So I took my parents up on their offer, they had told me my whole life. "if you ever need ANYTHING, don't hesitate to call". This is probably not what they had in mind, but I didn't know what else to do. I knew they would be in bed and I didn't want to alarm them, so I tried to stay cool and collected. As soon as my dad answered the phone, I saw the mouse run across the floor and I screamed. Now, knowing my parents, I knew they would be thinking something awful had happened to me, like a car wreck or something. After my scream, I tried to calmly tell my dad, that I was okay. I told him about the mouse and asked what I should do. The only thing close by that open that late was Walgreens. I went there, all the while on the phone with my dad, and got some mouse traps. Let me tell you, if I could have afforded, I would have stayed in hotel that night. I got home, barricaded myself in my room, waited till morning. I called Ryan to come and look for the mice. I answered the door in t-shirt, shorts, hiking boots and a broom in my hand. It wasn't a pretty site. Of course, he couldn't find it, so I was stuck there with this new roommate that scared me to death. Overtime, my apartment and the girls apartment next to mine got so infested with mice, they ended up moving her to a different unit and I just found a whole new apartment building several miles away.
I hate mice. I hate how they make me feel. I love our house, but I can tell you, if I ever see a mouse in here, I will no longer like my house. So this all brings me to my dead friend on the sidewalk. It makes me feel awful and almost sick feeling that there is a mouse, dead or alive, that close to my house.