Mouse Rat Quotes

Reader, you must know that an interesting fate (sometimes involving rats, sometimes not) awaits almost everyone, mouse or man, who does not conform.

Mickey Mouse is just a rat in suspenders.

Another reptilian brain disguised as a modest mouse in the rat race.

The Rum Tum Tugger is a Curious Cat: If you offer him pheasant he would rather have grouse. If you put him in a house he would much prefer a flat, If you put him in a flat then he'd rather have a house. If you set him on a mouse then he only wants a rat, If you set him on a rat then he'd rather chase a mouse. Yes the Rum Tum Tugger is a Curious Cat - And there isn't any call for me to shout it: For he will do As he do do And there's no doing anything about it!

There are few things ever dreamed of, smoked or injected that have as addictive an effect on our brains as technology. This is how our devices keep us captive and always coming back for more. The definitive Internet act of our times is a perfect metaphor for the promise of reward: we search. And we search. And we search some more, clicking that mouse like – well, like a rat in a cage seeking another “hit”, looking for the elusive reward that will finally feel like enough.

One of the most stupid things in life is not to enter the door which is wide open just because of the fear that this door will be shut and going back will be impossible! Have some courage, because even a harvest mouse leaves his hole to discover new places!

Hypotyposis is the rhetorical effect by which words succeed in rendering a visual scene.

The rat is the mous- tache in the trache. the wrong- doer in the soer.

A brick could be used to block a mouse hole. But something better that would not only block the hole physically, but also psychologically, would be to stuff a dead rat in the hole.


Once, a long time ago, a teacher at school had called Hal “a little mouse,” and the description had offended her, though she hadn’t really known why. But now she knew why. Whatever she looked like on the surface, inside, deep in the core of her, she was not a mouse, but something quite different: a rat—small, dark, tenacious, and dogged. And now she felt like a cornered rat, fighting to survive.

A mouse can fall down a mine shaft a third of a mile deep without injury. A rat falling the same distance would break his bones; a man would simply splash ... Elephants have their legs thickened to an extent that seems disproportionate to us, but this is necessary if their unwieldy bulk is to be moved at all ... A 60-ft. man would weigh 1000 times as much as a normal man, but his thigh bone would have its area increased by only 100 times ... Consequently such an unfortunate monster would break his legs the moment he tried to move. [Expressing, in picturesque terms, the strength of an organism relative to its bulk.]

HOUSE, n. A hollow edifice erected for the habitation of man, rat, mouse, beetle, cockroach, fly, mosquito, flea, bacillus and microbe.

So utterly lost was he to all sense of reverence for the many marvels of their majestic bulk and mystic ways; and so dead to anything like an apprehension of any possible dangers from encountering them; that in his poor opinion, the wondrous whale was but a species of magnified mouse, or at least water rat, requiring only a little circumvention and some small application of time and trouble in order to kill and boil.

In science class, Mr. As. told us about an experiment where they got this rat or mouse, and they put this rat or mouse on one side of a cage. On the other side of the cage, they put a little piece of food. And this rat or mouse would walk over to the food and eat. Then, they put the rat or mouse back on xsdc original side, and this time, they put electricity all through the floor where the rat or mouse would have to walk to get the piece of food. They did this for a while, and the rat or mouse stopped going to get the food at a certain amount of voltage. Then, they repeated the experiment, but they replaced the food with something that gave the rat or mouse intense pleasure. I don't know what it was that gave them intense pleasure, but I am guessing it is some kind of rat or mouse nip. Anyway, what the scientists found out was that the rat or mouse would put up with a lot more voltage for the pleasure. Even more than for the food. I don't know the significance of this, but I find it very interesting.

I am reminded,” said the Mouser, “of what a witch told me about adepts. She said that, if an adept chances to die, his soul is reincarnated in a mouse. If, as a mouse, he managed to kill a rat, his soul passes over into a rat. As a rat, he must kill a cat; as a cat, a wolf; as a wolf, a panther; and, as a panther, a man. Then he can recommence his adeptry. Of course, it seldom happens that anyone gets all the way through the sequence and in any case it takes a very long time. Trying to kill a rat is enough to satisfy a mouse with mousedom.

Dear Miss Tremor. You are smart and kind and pretty. I think you have really excellent stuff under your clothes and I would like to see it, please. Let's go on a date and get married and you can be my rodent queen in my castle in the sewer. Love always and forever, --Mouse. P.S. I am sorry my rats ate some of your candy.

Pinch the foot of a mouse (or naked mole-rat) and it will pull its limb away, and probably lick and groom it. Offer painkillers and it will accept. These actions resemble what a hurt human might do, and since a rodent’s brain is similar enough to ours, we can reasonably guess that its nociceptive reflex is accompanied by pain. But such arguments by analogy are always fraught, especially when it comes to animals with very different bodies and nervous systems. A leech will writhe when pinched, but are those movements analogous to human suffering, or to an arm unconsciously pulling away from a hot pan? Other animals may hide their pain. Social creatures can call for help by whining when they’re injured, but an anguished antelope would likely keep quiet lest its distress calls convey weakness to a lion. The signs of pain vary from one species to another. How, then, do you tell if an animal is experiencing it?

The rabies virus, for example, is programmed to infect parts of the animal brain that induce uncontrollable rage, while at the same time replicating in the salivary glands to spread itself best through the provoked frenzy of biting.304 Toxoplasma, though not a virus, uses a similar mechanism to spread. The parasite infects the intestines of cats, is excreted in the feces, and is then picked up by an intermediate host—like a rat or mouse—who is eaten by another cat to complete the cycle. To facilitate its spread, toxoplasma worms its way into the rodent’s brain and actually alters the rodent’s behavior, amazingly turning the animal’s natural anti-predator aversion to cats into an imprudent attraction.305

If it were a bedtime story, I’d call it A Rat’s Tale and begin something like this: "Once upon a time there was a curious cat who lived in front of a field filled with possibility. On one particularly perfect summer afternoon he surprised his about to turn 15-year-old owner with an early birthday present. Though appreciative of the gesture, the boy decided to bestow a gift of his own by returning it." Anyway… Z’s caught quite a few field mice in his time but this was the first real-deal rat I've seen him get. Not that he necessarily hasn't, considering how he roams around out back all by himself pretty much any time he feels like it. For all I know, he'd already eaten one for breakfast this morning and had his fill. Which might also explain why he set him free right next to me just as I was finishing up with my milkshake. With mixing it I mean. He ‒ I mean it ‒ seemed pretty small as far as rats go but was still way bigger than a regular old field mouse. Actually, this’ll likely take a while as it is so I think I'll keep referring to it as he after all. Though I didn't exactly get a great look down there, I’m pretty sure that I saw a teeny-tiny ballsack.

Washington University found that adding a single extra gene dramatically boosted a mouse’s memory and ability. These “smart mice” could navigate mazes faster, remember events better, and outperform other mice in a wide variety of tests. They were dubbed “Doogie mice,” after the precocious character on the TV show Doogie Howser, M.D. Dr. Tsien began by analyzing the gene NR2B, which acts like a switch controlling the brain’s ability to associate one event with another. (Scientists know this because when the gene is silenced or rendered inactive, mice lose this ability.) All learning depends on NR2B, because it controls the communication between memory cells of the hippocampus. First Dr. Tsien created a strain of mice that lacked NR2B, and they showed impaired memory and learning disabilities. Then he created a strain of mice that had more copies of NR2B than normal, and found that the new mice had superior mental capabilities. Placed in a shallow pan of water and forced to swim, normal mice would swim randomly about. They had forgotten from just a few days before that there was a hidden underwater platform. The smart mice, however, went straight to the hidden platform on the first try. Since then, researchers have been able to confirm these results in other labs and create even smarter strains of mice. In 2009, Dr. Tsien published a paper announcing yet another strain of smart mice, dubbed “Hobbie-J” (named after a character in Chinese cartoons). Hobbie-J was able to remember novel facts (such as the location of toys) three times longer than the genetically modified strain of mouse previously thought to be the smartest. “This adds to the notion that NR2B is a universal switch for memory formation,” remarked Dr. Tsien. “It’s like taking Michael Jordon and making him a super Michael Jordan,” said graduate student Deheng Wang. There are limits, however, even to this new mice strain. When these mice were given a choice to take a left or right turn to get a chocolate reward, Hobbie-J was able to remember the correct path for much longer than the normal mice, but after five minutes he, too, forgot. “We can never turn it into a mathematician. They are rats, after all,” says Dr. Tsien. It should also be pointed out that some of the strains of smart mice were exceptionally timid compared to normal mice. Some suspect that, if your memory becomes too great, you also remember all the failures and hurts as well, perhaps making you hesitant. So there is also a potential downside to remembering too much.

If a man jumped as high as a louse (lice), he would jump over a football field. In Ancient Egypt, the average life expectancy was 19 years, but for those who survived childhood, the average life expectancy was 30 years for women and 34 years for men. The volume of the moon is equivalent to the volume of the water in the Pacific Ocean. After the 9/11 incident, the Queen of England authorized the guards to break their vow and sing America’s national anthem for Americans living in London. In 1985, lifeguards of New Orleans threw a pool party to celebrate zero drownings, however, a man drowned in that party. Men and women have different dreams. 70 percent of characters in men’s dreams are other men, whereas in women its 50 percent men and 50 percent women. Men also act more aggressively in dreams than women. A polar bear has a black skin. 2.84 percent of deaths are caused by intentional injuries (suicides, violence, war) while 3.15 percent are caused by diarrhea. On average people are more afraid of spiders than they are afraid of death. A bumblebee has hairs on its eyes, helping it collect the pollen. Mickey Mouse’s creator, Walt Disney feared mice. Citarum river in Indonesia is the dirtiest and most polluted river in the world. When George R R Martin saw Breaking Bad’s episode called “Ozymandias”, he called Walter White and said that he’d write up a character more monstrous than him. Maria Sharapova’s grunt is the loudest in the Tennis game and is often criticized for being a distraction. In Mandarin Chinese, the word for “kangaroo” translates literally to “bag rat”. The first product to have a barcode was a chewing gum Wrigley. Chambarakat dam in Iraq is considered the most dangerous dam in the world as it is built upon uneven base of gypsum that can cause more than 500,000 casualties, if broken. Matt Urban was an American Lieutenant Colonel who was nicknamed “The Ghost” by Germans because he always used to come back from wounds that would kill normal people.

108I was a rat perhaps, but never a mouse.

Three mice are sitting in a bar late at night, in a pretty rough neighborhood, trying to impress one another about how tough they are. The first mouse slams back a shot of scotch, pounds the shot glass to the bar, turns to the other mice, and says, “When I see a mousetrap, I get on it, lie on my back, and set it off with my foot. When the bar comes down, I catch it in my teeth and then bench-press it a hundred times.” The second mouse orders up two shots of tequila. He grabs one in each paw, slams back the shots, and pounds the glasses to the bar. He turns to the other mice and says, “Yeah, well when I see rat poison, I collect as much of it as I can and take it home. In the morning, I grind it up into a powder and put it in my coffee so I get a good buzz going for the rest of the day.” At that point the first two mice turn to the third, wondering how he can possibly top this. The third mouse lets out a long sigh and says, “I don’t have time for this bullshit. I gotta go home and fuck the cat.

Now these remarks caused a great deal of resentment, hatred, misery, bloodshed, and death. The creatures began to quarrel, and then to wage war with one another. The owl families were continually in disagreement with the hawk families. Neither the hawk families nor the owl families would listen to the entreaties of the swan families to live in peace with them. The magpie quarrelled with every bird and with the smaller animals, especially the mouse and rat families.

Another little rule (for medical scientists especially) is that mice, rats, and other laboratory animals should never be injected. Few hypodermic needles are large enough for even the smallest mouse to pass through, especially if it is injected with something. ("Mice were injected wiht rabbit serum albumin mixed with Freund's adjuvant," we read. "Ah, but what into?" the cry goes up.)

You heard me. Home at the stroke of twelve and not a second later.” “What time is it now? Nearly ten?” “That gives you two wonderful hours to win the prince’s heart. Good luck!” “Why? Why midnight?” Godnutter glowers at me. “Let’s just say I’ve noticed your evenings with men run a lot later than I approve of. I don’t want you misbehaving with this prince. And if you’re thinking of disobeying me,” she wags the pipe stem at me, “I have set the spell so everything that’s been enchanted will turn back to it’s true form at midnight. Even the things you put white magic on! You’ll have nothing but a pumpkin, two rats, a mouse, and a dowdy dress. So watch the clock or it could get quite embarrassing!” I slam the door shut. “Drop dead, Godnutter!” I shout as the carriage begins to roll. “I already did that!” she calls after me, following it with her nasty cackle. I look back and the spot where she stood is now vacant. But her crazy laugh lingers, chasing me into the night.

Don’t worry, Raj, it’s not a mouse.” “No?” “No, it’s a rat.” Then Raj’s eyes bulged and he let out a deafening scream. “AAAAAAAAAAA​ AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA​ AAAAAAAAAAAA​ AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA​ AAAAAAAAAAAA​ AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRR​ RRRRRRRRRRRRR​ RRRRRRRRRRRRR​ RRRRRRRRRRRRR​ RRRRRRRRRR​ RRR​ RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR​ RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR​ RRRRR​ RRRRRRRR​ RR​ RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR​ RRRRRRRRRRRR​ RRRR​ RR​ GGGGGGG​ GGGGGGGGGG​ GGGGG​ GGGGGG​ GGGGGGGGGGGG​ GG​ GGGGGGG​ GGGGGGGG​ GGGGG​ GGGGG​ G​ GGGGGGGGGGGG​ GG​ GGGGGGG​ GGGGGGGG​ GGGGG​ GGGGGG​ GGGGGG​ GGGGGGGGG​ H​ HHHHHHHHH​ HHHHHHHHHHHHH​ H​ HHHHHHHHH​ HHHHHHHHHHHHH​ H​ HHHHHHHHH​ HHHHHHHHHHH!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!​ !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!​ !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

promise of reward: We search. And we search. And we search some more, clicking that mouse like—well, like a rat in a cage seeking another “hit,

Cheese by Maisie Aletha Smikle and Abigail LaTonya Waugh Cheese Cheese Cheese I must get some cheese A rat I must appease And put Micky mouse at ease I need cheese for the steak To shred and bake To make bread and cake While I'm awake Warm cheese is so gooey Heat it longer it melts to oil Floating when it’s boiled Water and oil they just won’t jive When they’re together They are still apart Oil refuses to be absorbed or victimized Frozen cheese is frozen oil hard as ice Grill cheese on toasts Stuff cheese in a roast Cubed cheese on fried rice Tasty and filled with spice While I play ball All I could think of was cheese ball O how I would love to munch On a very big bunch Pizza and cheese went to the circus fair It was indeed a festive affair In the cool breeze Pizza got married to cheese Clown brought the tux and gown On his way into town Pizza and cheese profess their love for each other And swore they'll forever be together Cheese promised pizza never to leave So to cheese, pizza cleave Pizza stuck to cheese like glue And vowed to bond after saying I do

Jill showed friend Kay the cute white mice. They liked to run races for cheese. Mice were lots of fun to play with. Jill said, "Take Poopsie, the male one, please!

A rat,” she said, breathless. “Behind that box. It’s four feet long.” Lucy wasn’t trying to get at anything in the closet. “I think you scared my dog,” he said. “The rat scared her, I bet.” Noah entered the closet cautiously, kicked the box, and when nothing rustled, he pulled it out a bit. Ah. Behind the box was a dead mouse. Probably four inches long at best. It was very dead, dried out, kaput. He lifted it by the tail and held it toward her. “Is this the rat?” “No. My rat is much bigger. That must be its baby.” “Maybe you just got scared and it looked much bigger.” “No,” she said. “There’s a rat the size of a Volkswagen in there.” “Was it a dead rat, Ellie?” “Possibly. It wasn’t moving.” He went into the downstairs bathroom and dropped the thing in the trash. “Why did you do that?” she yelled, getting to her feet. “What if he gets out of there and attacks me?” “He’s petrified. It’s over,” Noah said. Then he smiled at her. “I’ll protect you.” “Right,” she said. “So far you don’t even have the real rat! What good are you?

Let us at least call things what they are, no matter what else the law permits or prohibits. It may be in convenient and at times even costly to treat our littles laboratory animals like animals, living creatures to be spared from needless stress and suffering and death. But the law does not deal in convenient fictions. the laws must speak in the language of truth, and science always the language of reality, even when they are humble realities like Mouse and Rat and Bird. They are animals too, with or without the blessing of the secretary of agriculture.

The incidental camouflage provided by his ashen coat against the tile flooring ‒ likewise denoted as being a series of twelve inch gray slate squares by all of them again ‒ save for Nate’s mother ‒ in concert with his current focus on the mixer and its hypnotic, simultaneous whir; which drew his visual attention to the blue pearl granite countertop directly in front of him and induced his total disregard for the feline's entrance. He therefore failed to observe that it was marked by an inordinately determined gait ‒ itself relatively less peculiar than the paradoxical lack of conviction in his clenched jaws, out of which a visibly dispirited common brown rat was loosely dangling by the nape of its neck. Upon shutting off the mixer and sensing a presence, Nate glanced intuitively downward ‒ just as Zero had raised his head sharply and looked up with eager, widened eyes ‒ then becoming struck by a sense that it appeared in the moment as if the incongruous mouser had been instead transporting an itsy-bitsy newborn kitten. Then in the next, he casually dropped the rodent at his owner's feet. Being sufficiently emboldened by its youthful size and appearance to first crouch and then kneel to the floor for a closer look, Nate endeavored to roust the lethargic rodent with a toothpick. He was taken aback to discover a set of tiny ‒ though notably bulging ‒ coal black eyes returning his gaze. Their vacant helplessness inspired him toward an appreciably more sober contemplation of its plight than he’d undertaken upon witnessing Zero capture and kill a field mouse behind his apple tree the previous spring. An instance whereby he had caught but a fleeting glimpse of its limp body as his typically passive, then suddenly feral tomcat clamped down on its entire neck just prior to seeking a more private spot in which to consume his prey. Nate realized that if he'd intended to eat this latest catch, his since neutered pet would have remained outside and carried it in a similar manner; so being the softhearted sort, while possessing a firm understanding that upon his mother's imminent arrival in a chic skirt with matching heels, the tragic scene of a dying and worse yet ‒ possibly bleeding ‒ brown Norway rat on her Montauk Blue tile flooring would be ill-received, he suffered the burden of understanding that this rodent's fate might be in his hands.

Picking up its first page and then sitting as still and as quiet as a mute mouse meditating in a monastery, he scanned to the bottom and found these words: Long before becoming an urban jungle, Manhattan was inhabited by the Lenape Indians who called it Mannahatta ‒ the 'isle of many hills'...

Make please with the cheese,” he demanded. “But snappy.” “You want some snappy cheese?” Jack inquired. “I do not care what kind of teeth the cheese is using,” Feep asserted. “Just so there is plenty of it. Let it be long and strong. Let it be mean and green. Let it be old with mould. But bring me lots of plenty in a fast hurry.” Jack scribbled his order and shuffled away. Lefty Feep turned and I saw his beady eyes were unstrung. “Cheese,” he whispered reverently. “Limburger with real limbs! Thick brick! I love it. Swiss is bliss. Cheddar is better. Camembert is the nerts!” I stared. “What’s the matter?” I asked. “You sound like a cross between Ogden Nash and Mickey Mouse. Since when did you develop such a passion for cheese?” “It is not all for me,” Feep explained. “I take some of it to a friend of mine.” “Are you hanging around with a bunch of rats?” Feep shook his head. “I do not see Gorilla Gabface for weeks,” he declared. “Then what in the world —” I began, but didn’t finish. For

Not a mouse, not a rat, would have come near my Path.

I headed straight for the half-bathroom I remembered seeing on my other visits over. I peed and started washing my hands, and it was when I reached for a towel that I happened to look down and saw something small and brown run across the floorboard. I froze. Leaning over just a little, I peeked around the toilet and saw it again. Two little eyes. One bare tail. About two inches long. It darted off, disappearing around the trash can. I wasn’t proud of myself… but I screamed. Not loud, but it was still a scream. And then I got the hell out of there. Honestly, I wasn’t sure I’d ever moved so fast going down the hall, thankful I’d seen him after I’d pulled my pants on and zipped them up, going as far away from the bathroom as possible. Which ended up being the kitchen. Rhodes was standing by the island, tearing paper towels off when he noticed me coming. A frown came over his face. “What’s—” “There’s a mouse in the bathroom!” I squeaked and went past him, pretty much leaping onto the stool beside the counter, then jumping from there to the back of the couch with a frantic look toward the floor to make sure I hadn’t been followed. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Amos stood up so fast the chair he was in fell backward, and the next thing I knew, he’d leaped onto the couch and ended up beside me, his butt propped up on the back of it, legs dangling inches off the floor in the air. Johnny and Jackie either didn’t care or were so stunned by Amos and me, that they hadn’t moved a single inch from the table. “A rat?” Rhodes asked from the exact same spot he’d been in. I shook my head at him, exhaling hard to try and bring my heart rate down. “No, a mouse.” His eyebrows crept up about a half-inch, but I noticed it. “You’re screaming because of a mouse?” Did he have to ask so slowly? I swallowed. “Yes!” He blinked. Beside me, Amos suddenly snorted deep in his throat like he hadn’t knocked his chair over. Then I noticed that Rhodes’s chest was shaking. “What?” I asked, eyeing the floor again. His chest was shaking even more, and he barely managed to wheeze out, both eyes squeezing closed, “I… I didn’t know you were into parkour.” Amos snorted again, lowering his legs and planting his feet. “You backflipped onto the table…,” Rhodes choked out. He was wheezing. The son of a bitch was wheezing. “No, I did not!” I argued, starting to feel just a little bit… foolish. I hadn’t. I didn’t know how to backflip. “You jumped from the island to the couch,” Rhodes kept going, raising a fist to hold it right in front of his nose. He could barely talk. “Your face… Ora, it was so white,” Am started, bottom lip starting to tremble. I pressed my lips together and stared at my favorite traitor. “My soul left my body for a second, Am. And you didn’t exactly walk over here either, okay.” Rhodes, who decided that this was what he was going to find hilarious, barely choked out, “You looked like you saw a ghost.” Amos burst out laughing. Then Rhodes burst out laughing. One quick glance confirmed that Johnny was chuckling too, Jackie was the only one giving me a smile. I was glad someone had a heart. They were cracking up, totally and completely cracking up. “You know, I hope it crawls into one of your mouths for being so mean to me,” I muttered, joking. Mostly. Rhodes grinned so wide, he came over and slapped his son on the back while they both kept laughing. At me. But together. And maybe I wasn’t going to be able to sleep tonight now, worried there might be a mouse next door, but it would be worth it.

Let us at least call things what they are, no matter what else the law permits or prohibits. It may be inconvenient and at times even costly to treat our littlest laboratory animals like animals, living creatures to be spared from needless stress and suffering and death. But the law does not deal in convenient fictions. The laws must speak in the language of truth, and science always the language of reality, even when they are humble realities like Mouse and Rat and Bird. They are animals too, with or without the blessing of the secretary of agriculture.

Studies dating back to the 1930s have found that limiting caloric intake can lengthen the lifespan of a mouse or a rat by anywhere from 15 to 45 percent, depending on the age of onset and degree of restriction.

but 25 or 30 percent fewer total calories (more or less). The restricted animals are then compared against the controls. The results have been remarkably consistent. Studies dating back to the 1930s have found that limiting caloric intake can lengthen the lifespan of a mouse or a rat by anywhere from 15 to 45 percent, depending on the age of onset and degree of restriction. Not only that, but the underfed animals also seem to be markedly healthier for their age, developing fewer spontaneous tumors than normally fed mice. CR seems to improve their healthspan in addition to their lifespan.

Gods took many of the animals, too. In the end, only six kinds of creatures were left in the Million Acre Wood for the canids to hunt: Deer, raccoon, rabbit, squirrel, rat, mouse.

As the biologist J. B. S. Haldane metaphorically described the advantages of smallness: “You can drop a mouse down a thousandyard mineshaft; and on arriving at the bottom, it gets a slight shock and walks away. A rat is killed, a man broken, a horse splashes.”3

Indeed, the nervous system of the octopus, thought to be the most intelligent invertebrate, is comprised of approximately half a billion neurons, more than six times the number in a mouse brain. Additionally, like humans, dolphins, and elephants, octopuses have a brain with a folded surface, ostensibly to pack in more neurons in a confined space, in contrast to the smooth-surfaced brains of other cephalopods, mice, rats, and marmosets. Thus although octopuses don’t have cortical regions associated with ToM, they have an exceptionally large brain capacity and may have evolved to solve the problem of ToM using different anatomical strategies.

The site of Penelope and Florence breaking through the rats made Melvin’s brain kick in to gear.

Manhattan is dangerous, though not for the old reasons: muggings, pickpocketing, prostitution. The danger is that the longer you stay - the longer you're bathed in the glow of blinking screens in Times Square, swept along by swarms of commuters, pursued by a mangy imitation of Mickey Mouse who wants a few dollars to pose for photos - the less you're able to feel the wonder. The lights dim. The little battles with subway doors, your radiator, the rat that walks into you in Union Square as if you were the rodent, wear you down. You grow tired, switch off certain receptors. For years I paid little attention of my city, and in time, it disappeared. I put on sunglasses, put in earbuds, and blindly walked the streets that Billie Holiday and Roy Lichtenstein had walked. Every parade was an inconvenience, as was every stranger, talking too loudly, walking too slowly. I was living in one of the most visited cities in America, working in a skyscraper that people from all over the world stopped to photograph, and skipping town whenever possible.

One Day Eight Years Ago - Poem by Jibanananda Das It was heard: to the post-mortem cell he had been taken; last night—in the darkness of Falgoon-night When the five-night-old moon went down— he was longing for death. His wife lay beside—the child therewith; hope and love abundant__in the moonlight—what ghost did he see? Why his sleep broke? Or having no sleep at all since long—he now has fallen asleep in the post-mortem cell. Is this the sleep he’d longed for! Like a plagued rat, mouth filled with crimson froth now asleep in the nook of darkness; And will not ever awake anymore. ‘Never again will wake up, never again will bear the endless—endless burden of painful waking—’ It was told to him when the moon sank down—in the strange darkness by a silence like the neck of a camel that might have shown up at his window side. Nevertheless, the owl stays wide awake; The rotten still frog begs two more moments in the hope for another dawn in conceivable warmth. We feel in the deep tracelessness of flocking darkness The unforgiving enmity of the mosquito-net all around; The mosquito loves the stream of life awake in its monastery of darkness. From sitting in blood and filth, flies fly back into the sun; How often we watched moths and flies hovering in the waves of golden sun. The close-knit sky, as if—as it were, some scattered lives, possessed their hearts; The wavering dragonflies in the grasp of wanton kids Fought for life; As the moon went down, in the impending gloom With a noose in hand you approached the aswattha, alone, by yourself, For you’d learnt a human would ne’er live the life of a locust or a robin The branch of aswattha Had it not raged in protest? And the flock of fireflies Hadn’t they come and mingled with the comely bunch of daffodils? Hadn’t the senile blind owl come over and said: ‘the age-old moon seems to have been washed away by the surging waters? Splendid that! Let’s catch now rats and mouse! ’ Hadn’t the owl hooted out this cherished affair? Taste of life—the fragrance of golden corn of winter evening— seemed intolerable to you; — Content now in the morgue In the morgue—sultry with the bloodied mouth of a battered rat! Listen yet, tale of this dead; — Was not refused by the girl of love, Didn’t miss any joy of conjugal life, the bride went ahead of time and let him know honey and the honey of reflection; His life ne’er shivered in demeaning hunger or painful cold; So now in the morgue he lies flat on the dissection table. Know—I know woman’s heart—love—offspring—home—not all there is to things; Wealth, achievement, affluence apart there is some other baffling surprise that whirls in our veins; It tires and tires, and tires us out; but there is no tiring in the post mortem cell and so, there he rests, in the post mortem cell flat on the dissection table. Still I see the age-old owl, ah, Nightly sat on the aswattha bough Winks and echoes: ‘The olden moon seems to be carried away by the flooding waters? That’s splendid! Let’s catch now rats and mouse—’ Hi, granny dear, splendid even today? Let me age like you—and see off the olden moon in the whirlpool at the Kalidaha; Then the two of us will desert life’s abundant reserve.

It led on and on; vistas of forgotten metal; moribund, stiff in a thousand attitudes of mortality; with not a rat, not a mouse; not a bat, not a spider. Only the Lamb, sitting in his high chair with a faint smile upon his lips; alone in the luxury of his vaulted chamber, where the red carpet was like blood, and the walls were lined with books that rose up...up... volume after volume until the shadows engulfed them.

Bad Trash ( I Don't Like the Sound of That) Runs in the family R u n s in the f a m i l y- No, that's an atrocity you won't hear from me I don't like the sound of that Not lyin' in a mouse trap- I'm a mofo' sassy cat I don't clean no d i r t y rat No, not my reality Said not M Y reality- Don't shine shit in front of me and call it my reality! I don't like the sound of that Cruel intentions get tires flat I say what will shine for me I say what will bleed for me I call out the trash to me Bad trash always dies for me Clawed out my own reality The top from the back alley I don't run in the family I run far from the alley Calling all my sour soulmates- Recovering a l l e y c a ts You all clean up so good now No bad, bad trash, just LoVe pats! No bad trash, just LoVe pats

We ripped off anyone who made a record, whether it was dripping paint on our clothes, sticking zips on our T-shirts… even down to our first drummer, Craig Newnham (whose brother Shaun was briefly the very first singer for the band), having a rat in his bass drum. It wasn’t that punk tho’, ’cos he told his mum it was a giant African mouse or she would have thrown him and it out of the house!