Of Mice and... Spiders?

  

This is a view of the field beyond the fence of our backyard.  Creatures live there.  Creatures like rabbits and mice and spiders and only when my imagination is running rampant, a beast with red eyes that only I can see or perhaps a tall skinny guy in a suit - see this link.

Last year being our first summer in this house, we were hit with these big, creepy looking spiders. They took up residence in the window wells of our basement and built elaborate webs.  I'd have left them alone except they started coming inside and scaring Mike, so I had to do something about them.  I set out with the bug spray and took care of all the outside nests.  We were spider free for about a year after that.

Until yesterday...

I woke and looked out the window in the hopes it was raining because I heard tiny ticking noises, which reminded me of the rain hitting the metal of the window.  It wasn't raining.  I dressed and took Gimli out for his walk, while Mike slept.  We returned, I fed Gimli and started breakfast when I heard Mike walking around upstairs.

Then, I heard this:

"Candy, can you come up here for a minute?"

My water was just starting to boil, "What for?"

"Um, something I need to show you."

I joined Mike upstairs and found him standing in front of the same window I had looked out before with the vacuum plugged in right next to it.  With the blinds drawn up and Mike standing about an arm's length away, he said, "Look at the window sill."

Here I was thinking the sill was somehow damaged, I look at it only to see this on the other side of the open window.

Yes, you're asking yourself, "WTF is that?"  I asked the same thing until I saw these fair sized little dead spiders lying next to it.  You can't see them in this picture because I had already sucked them up with the vacuum, but I assure you, they were all around it.

Mike suspects the ticking noise I heard was the spiders coming out of that cocoon thing and falling down on the window sill.

Inside that cocoon thing, there was one creepy dead spider, which continues to scare Mike even though its dead.  He won't even look at the picture!

I dislodged the cocoon and it went sliding down the roof.  I sucked up the remaining gross things and went back to breakfast.  I thought it was the end of the creepy things.

Until this evening...

After work, I was dragging the hose from the side of the house to water the plants in the front.  My flowering shrub is throwing out flowers and they look so lovely that I just had to water it in the hopes of more flowers!  I yanked the hose through the bottom of the gate when something moved in the corner of my eye.  I looked over to see a little black mouse scurry up the side of the house and toward the front garden.

Eeeek!  I can handle spiders, but mice, Eeeeek!

I lost track of it by the time I got to the front of the house, but I'm so very paranoid now.  I'm sure its coming from the field in the back and I'm wondering if perhaps we need a cat?  All the more reason to keep the garage door closed, see, who's paranoid now?

(I'm obsessive about keeping the garage door closed to prevent someone from stealing the snow blower and our food from the freezer or from just sneaking in and taking refuge in our house like that Japanese homeless woman who lived in a man's closet for months before he discovered her.  Its true, look it up!)