Indian Summer in The Tomb

I moved into The Tomb this past November, so the past few days here have been a rude introduction to how insufferable this place is going to be during the dog days of summer.

And the past few days have represented ideal conditions. Both roommates away. The messier one is away for two whole months. I've gotten some major cleaning done, with no one here to UNDO the major cleaning.

Yet the apartment as a whole is hot and humid and sticky, with a lingering, acrid stench that can't quite be pinpointed to any one source. The place just smells fundamentally spoiled. The sort of spoilage that would require an extreme home makeover to rectify.

During the wee hours of Sunday mourning, I opened my bedroom door to find the cat playing with a live mouse. First time I've seen a live mouse in the vicinity of The Tomb. The cat had actually been acting a little weird all of Saturday—staring under the refrigerator, searching out the bookcases—but I just thought she going through the paranoid cat routine. Less people around, she's gotta keep herself stimulated. But it turns out she was on the hunt.

Best part of having a cat is having a 24-hour mouse-hunter. Could have used one in the Fortress of Solitude 2.0.

But the cat... she was playing with the mouse. Pouncing on it. Letting to go. Catching it again.

I closed my bedroom door, hoping to let her just do her business.

I think she ended up losing her live plaything, though. Next time I checked, she was hunting around the bookcases. No mouse body in sight. I don't know what I was expecting: that she would kill it and dispose of it in the trash bin? In hindsight, I should have helped her out when she was playing with it...