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I have been trying catch a little mouse for a week. Set traps, no luck.
Then, I walk in the shop early today, all the lights are off and I stumble my way around to find the light switch and trip over chairs, extension cords, and when I turn the lights on I find I stepped on the little guy! It wasn't the extension cord I stepped on!
He was still wiggling a little, so I tossed him out in the grass. I turned around just in time to see him become breakfast for some bird.
That has to be the strangest thing that has happened in a while at our shop!
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Well, if we are going to tell shop mouse stories I have a few, but this one involves brand new brushes. A few years back, I treated myself to some new brushes. I took out a number eight and used it one day, then I cleaned it as usual, oiled it and put it in the brush box. The next day, my brand new brush was gone. Looked all over in case I used it again and sat it down somewhere while answering the phone. Nope. I got out another number eight and used that one, still upset about the missing new brush. The second one came up missing too after cleaning and oiling it.
Well, about a week later, I saw one of the new brushes by the floor heat register. The hairs were all dry and frazzled. Evidently, since I was using olive oil to preserve my brushes, this little mouse was taking them out of the box and licking the oil off of them. He must have carried the first one down the air vent, but got the other one stuck sideways.
I got a cat after that, but he decided to retire from mousing and just sleep and eat all the time. Well, except for the one time he brought a baby woodchuck into the office and turned it loose. Then he laid in my office chair and was totally amused at watching me chase down the woodchuck.
Pam, Pam's Signs
-------------------- Pam Eddy Niles, MI ple@qtm.net Posts: 460 | From: Michigan | Registered: Dec 2000
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I have bats that think my garage (30'x50'x14' ceiling) is a cave. I don't mind the bats living in my garage, I just wish they wouldn't crap on everything!
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
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I once came home from a supply run and the police was outside. The alarm was blaring. We went in and a squirrel not only had gotten into the shop and set it off, but it also had walked through a tray of oil paint, and it kept running through it some more as we chased it. Forest Green One Shot. Yikes.
-------------------- Myra A. Grozinger Signs Limited Winston-Salem, NC
signslimited@triad.rr.com Posts: 1244 | From: Winston-Salem, NC USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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A couple weeks ago I bought a Green Basilisk lizard to keep in the shop. This is the kind you see on nature shows that runs on its back legs on water. They are nicknamed Jesus lizards for that reason. The pet store gave him to me in a pillow case to take home. I left him on my weeding table while I cleaned the aquarium for him. When I brought the tank into the room where I left him I heard a noise. He had escaped and was on the floor. There are a million places he could go and never be seen again. I went toward him and he took off, jumped up on two legs and hauled a$$. I started laughing it looked so funny. Luckily he ran into the bathroom and into a corner where I could grab him. He scared the hell out of Walter the pigeon with a broken wing that has lived in my shop under a couple drafting tables for a couple of years.
-------------------- Dennis Goddard
Gibsonton Fl Posts: 1050 | From: Tampa Fl USA | Registered: Apr 2000
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I was at a flea market one day. A man there had some brushes for sale. Upon examining them, I realized they were lettering brushes. Some off name brand, but never used.
He had no idea what they were, and sold them to me for 25 cents each. Seriously. About 10 of them. I took them back to the shop and stashed them, my own little reserve treasure.
Upon getting them out a couple months later, I was dismayed to find the mice had chewed them to bits. There was one left that had 80% of the hairs left.
Use it or lose it.
-------------------- James Donahue Donahue Sign Arts 1851 E. Union Valley Rd. Seymour TN. (865) 577-3365 brushman@nxs.net
Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what's for lunch, Benjamin Franklin Posts: 2057 | From: 1033 W. Union Valley Rd. | Registered: Feb 2003
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For about a week in the spring we had a wren making a nest in the rafters of the new shop...everytime I opened the door...in it came with more "shtuff" when it would leave I close the door...trying to discourage the rascle.
I guess it got unoticed and trapped in side over a weekend and when I opened the door on Monday it flew out.
It came back several times roosted on the door and looked inside but never flew back in.
Who says you can't train a wild bird!
-------------------- "Werks fer me...it'll werk fer you"
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i have paint thinner in crystal light containers that i store my foam rollers in between coats...i didn't have a lid on one of them, well i trying to push the roller in the container and it wouldn't go...that's because a mouse had jumped in like a dumba$$ and he was on the bottom....yucccck! what a crappy way to go!
-------------------- Karyn Bush Simply Not Ordinary, LLC Bartlett, NH 603-383-9955 www.snosigns.com info@snosigns.com Posts: 3516 | From: Bartlett, NH USA | Registered: Jan 2001
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Couple years ago I flew out see my family at Christmas. The 3 day visit turned into 6 because of an ice-storm that shut everything down. After returning, I was anxious to get back to work and make up for lost time. Opened the door to my shop and it smelled like a zoo. Just then a big bird flew over my head and out the door. Don't know how long it was trapped in here but it looked like days!!! My ceilings are blown insulation- in was all over the floor. Thing apparently intended on leaving a calling card on everything in the shop. Took 2 days to clean it up. Got in through a tiny opening near the furnance. Thankfully the door to my office was shut- I can only imagine what it would have done in here.
-------------------- Linda Schmidt Vital D'Signs Greers Ferry, AR signlady@ozarkisp.net Posts: 160 | From: Greers Ferry, AR | Registered: Sep 2001
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Hummungbirds fly in through the rollup door to the fabrication shop. Once in, they won't look down but keep trying to fly out through the skylites. I have gone out there and found them lying dead on the floor a couple of times. They just fly til they burn out. Next time I saw one in there I put a red toolbox on top of a step ladder (they're attracted to red) in front of the roll door. He went right for the toolbox and then out the door.
I have a red "no smoking" symbol on the glass of the office door. Hummingbirds come to it throughout the day and hover for a few seconds. So, I put a suction-cup-mounted feeder on one of the storefront windows. They come to it now but still come to the no smoking symbol.
Little Carolina Wrens sometimes nest on shelves in the shop.
Deer sometimes come within yards of the shop.
-------------------- Wayne Webb Webb Signworks Chipley, FL 850.638.9329 wayne@webbsignworks.com Posts: 7405 | From: Chipley,Florida,United States | Registered: Oct 1999
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We too have hummingbirds fly in the big shop door. Found a skeleton once, but one day we saw the pretty little critter flying up by the lights. Just like Wanes' hummingbird it would not look down. I tried the trick I use for wasps & bees. I shut off the shop lights and the insects will go for the brighter light outside. It didn't work for the hummingbird though.
He finally exhausted himself and perched up on the flouresent lights, one leg up on a bulb and his long beak on the other. I put on a soft white pair of gloves and gently took him from the light. I went outside and opened my hands. He just sat there. I raised my hand quickly then dropped it to get him into flight. Nope... clamped tight to my glove.
It was so cute just sitting there in my hand, but I had work to do and was getting tired of him just sitting there, so I forced him to transfer from my hand to a tree branch. After about a half hour he was finally gone.
Now this story is definate weirdness, Every woodworker knows how wood expands... across the grain. I had a sandblasted redwood sign that split along a glue seam. Bad glue job? Nope! The board, a 1 3/4 inch thick by 6 inces wide gained LENGTH!
The board "grew" almost quarter of an inch. At one end the joint was still solid, but upon squeezing it together, you could see the letters (split right through a line of one inch letters) becoming more offset from their original position as you went to the opposite end. Totally weird.
When I had my shop...Brushworks.... I was in a strata building, owned my unit...11 units in a row. We were in the Flats, rats around. Mike kept smelling a "rotten smell" for days, in the early morning. Finally he busted a hole in the drywall dividing the next unit, down dropped a "fully rotting rat", along with plastic bags nesting materials. He travelled between units in the floor drains! We sprayed that area with watered down aftershave stuff for days!!!
I had put out rat poison earlier, and had put out "too much", so instead of drying up like a husk, he "died quick"
I'm not in the Flats anymore!!
John Lennig / SignRider
-------------------- John Lennig / Big Top Sign Arts 5668 Ewart Street, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada bigtopya@hotmail.com 604.451.0006 Posts: 2184 | From: Burnaby, British Columbia,Canada | Registered: Nov 2001
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If you're having rat or mouse problems in the work area, just borrow one of Bob Stephens' pets for a few days. Of course, you have to be more fond of reptiles than rodents.
-------------------- David Harding A Sign of Excellence Carrollton, TX Posts: 5106 | From: Carrollton, TX, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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I reached over my desk laate one night and turned off the desk lamp after working for several hours, without the light I could see through the lace curtain, and there was a sillouette of a very large snake moving around the window frame, assuming he was outside I carefully pulled the curtain back... quickly I left the office! He had slithered in under the gap in the front door, through the reception and up onto my desk. The 6'long King brown snake was kindly removed by one of my neighbours with a little less fear of snakes. There's no longer a gap under the door.
-------------------- Rik Russell, RIK THE SIGNWRITER Innisfail, NQ. Australia rikthesignwriter@msn.com Posts: 28 | From: Innisfail, NQ. Australia | Registered: Jun 2003
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There used to be a chipmunk around who wasn't the brightest penny in the roll. Cat would catch him----often--- never hurt him, and turn him loose in the kitchen. I'd go open the door to the deck, and out would go the chipmunk. Well. he got caught so often, he got so he knew his way around the kitchen, and the last time I went to let him out, he made a side trip to the cat's dish, stuffed his cheeks full of the dry stuff, and then left. Talk about savoir faire.
The other one was the time one of the cats caught a flying squirrel and laid it at my feet in the shop. Lighting wasn't real good right there, and at a quick glance, I thought it was a rat. Went to look closer, it laid there all curled up and I thought it was dead. Cat grabbed it and ran off upstairs to the main part of the house, down the hall to my "office" and dropped it on the floor. I wanted to grab it---still not sure it was dead or not--- and I'm unsure whether I need thick gloves or not. Didn't matter---squirrel decided for me---came alive, ran up my clothes (on the outside, thank you very much) jumped off my head on to the curtains and from there proceeded to soar all over the place. Finally got him cornered in a closet back wall, and got a shoe box over him. Problem was, a clothes pole was also in the closet---my arm with the shoe box is over the pole and the other hand with the box lid is under the pole. Now what? Wife crawled between my legs up into the closet where she could get ahold of the box and lid from the same side of the pole. All this time the squirrel is calling us every name in the book, and a few I had never heard before.
Finally got this irate critter back outside and turned him loose---meantime kitty is sitting there looking ever-so-pleased with himself. Kitty almost lost his happy home over that one.
-------------------- Bill Preston Fly Creek, N.Y. USA Posts: 943 | From: Fly Creek, N.Y. USA | Registered: Jan 2000
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A couple of years ago while working in the garage, I had the overhead door open when a deer decided to stop in for a peek. The brazen little doe took a few glances around and then skipped off towards the neighbor's. I stopped for a while and realized that such a skiddish kritter coming within 8 feet of me was a good sign of how content and at peace I can sometimes be while working.
That was definitely one of my better days.
-------------------- Ray Rheaume Rapidfire Design 543 Brushwood Road North Haverhill, NH 03774 rapidfiredesign@hotmail.com 603-787-6803
I like my paint shaken, not stirred. Posts: 5648 | From: North Haverhill, New Hampshire | Registered: Apr 2003
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We have the "calendar turtle", a big mama snapper that climbs out of the pond and lays eggs in the ground every year on June 11. There's painted turtles galore, frogs, snakes, ducks, anything that likes wet. I have had mice in the shop too, but haven't lost any brushes that I know of. As for birds, I have had male robins go berserk trying to drive away the other male robin that (they think) lives inside the mirror on my shop truck.
As for other weird stories, when I worked in Phoenix an employee named John was up in the pattern loft above the office one Monday morning. He was a big fellow, very dark (he was Mexican/Polynesian/Chinese/Irish, and looked like a fat Hawaiian) and as the pattern loft was hot and nasty, he had taken off his shirt. Now the pattern loft wan't really a room, just a crawl space between the ceiling and the roof, and the "floor" was a few loose boards and such.
The boss and I were in the office with a customer, when suddenly there was a noise and a curse, then the ceiling exploded and John fell through it onto the counter, this huge brown guy in a shower of dust and crud. Our customer (it was a woman in a business suit) about jumped out of her skin. I managed to choke off laughing long enough to assure her that the problem of half-naked overweight Hawaiians falling through our roof was relatively under control.
-------------------- "A wise man concerns himself with the truth, not with what people believe." - Aristotle
Cam Bortz Finest Kind Signs Pondside Iron works 256 S. Broad St. Pawcatuck, Ct. 06379 "Award winning Signs since 1988" Posts: 3051 | From: Pawcatuck,Connecticut USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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quote:Originally posted by Cam Bortz: I managed to choke off laughing long enough to assure her that the problem of half-naked overweight Hawaiians falling through our roof was relatively under control.
Cam, thank you. The laugh I got from this eased my neck pain, if only for a few minutes.
Don Hulsey hasn't chimed in his story yet, so I will attempt to retell it, as best I can.
Seems he had a kitten. He taught the kitten that when Don patted his hip, the kitten was to climb up his pant leg and hang onto Don's toolbelt and Don would pet his head. One day a business woman in a dress showed up at Don's shop. For some unknown reason she tapped her hip. The kitten did as it was taught and crawled up her leg, shredding her panty hose. We're not sure if it got scared because it couldn't find the toolbelt to hang onto or because of what is saw up there, but there was this woman with shredded panty hose, a cat hanging on her hip, blood running down her leg & Don trying not to laugh.
-------------------- Chris Welker Wildfire Signs Indiana, Pa Posts: 4254 | From: Indiana, PA | Registered: Mar 2001
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Over the years we have had a visit from someones lost Iguana, a bird flying in one end of the shop and trying to fly out the other only to knock itself out on the window. It came to in my hand after about five minutes. A skunk wandered into the shop and just last week there was a pigeon whose leg was caught in the hinge of a step ladder. Twice I found a sparrow hanging by the neck from a string they tried to use in making a nest. The very weirdest was when we first enlarged our shop there was a knocking sound coming from the gas furnace and I couldn't figure what the cause was until I had to leave and as I backed out the driveway and looked back at the shop, there was a bird pecking on the metal chimney cover on the roof.
-------------------- Bill Riedel Riedel Sign Co., Inc. 15 Warren Street Little Ferry, N.J. 07643 billsr@riedelsignco.com Posts: 2953 | From: Little Ferry, New Jersey, USA | Registered: Feb 1999
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