I am not referring to the book of the same title by John Steinbeck although the idea of ‘workers trapped in a cycle forever’ does ring a bell. And on a completely unrelated note that reminds me of The Bicycle Men – if you haven’t seen it you won’t know what I’m talking about but this link might help http://www.thebicyclemen.com/

Anyhow back to the mice and men.

The mice. We have had four mouse sightings in the last 24 hours and I am beginning to suspect they are all separate mice and not the same one as there was another mouse running around quite happily even after I had put one mangled corpse in the bin. It has knocked the cats out; they are totally zonked after yesterday’s mousefest but there is still a little fellow sitting on the pipes in the downstairs john washing his whiskers. Jerry is in the John. Clearly he has worked out the cats don’t get access to there so it’s a good place to hang out. On the one hand I can’t stand to see the little things being hunted down but on a practical level the cats are there to keep vermin at bay so one has to, ultimately, accept the law of the jungle. Mice are terribly cute but they breed very, very quickly as we discovered years ago when my boy’s two pet mice turned into twelve.

At least I don’t stand on a chair and scream like a girl.

The men. Why. Apart from the tadpole things what is their function. I jest. Earlier on I was mulling over the line from When Harry Met Sally the ‘men and women can’t be friends because the sex part always gets in the way’ one. I suppose ultimately at some primal level that has a certain amount of truth in it as one of most basic human instincts is to reproduce. Ergo many of our friends of the opposite sex are at a subconscious level identifiable as potential mates. The human species being what it is - a kind of virus that covers half the planet (echoes from Red Dwarf!) - the urge is ever present in our loins. I don’t know why I thought about it at all except that I was dwelling on the basic instincts of the wee creatures in my house. We humans have buried our instincts beneath many, many layers – thank God! – but I guess it must still be there, reassuringly constant. Circle of life, cycle of life stuff all this. I am relieved to say though that when I have been out with male friends in various eating places I have never faked an orgasm.

They were all real.