Frank J. Buchman

Cowboy • Horseman • Writer

‘No Getaway’ Scheme Awaits

“Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door.”

There’s controversy who said that and when the comment was made.  Originally quoted in the 1880s, it’s a true statement, known for certainly.

Still nobody’s come up with that perfect mousetrap.

That has to be because those little furry varmints are so doggone smart.

Whatever the trapping method tried, those ornery pests keep scampering across the kitchen floor.

Perhaps a seasonal dilemma when the light-grayish-tan menaces come most frequently. Recent wind, hail and heavy rain sure brought more into protective cover.

A half-dozen “old reliable snap-traps” were set all around baited with cheese, butter, even peanut-butter.

“Snap” gave relief of successful kill, until checking revealed bait gone, but no catch. Oh, once there was a young mouse without wisdom enough to shy away.

It’s those old fat ones that find stealing trap food easier than scrounging for table drops.

There’s some success with expensive glue-traps. Problem with them more than once ended up on the house-shoes when stumbling around.

For several days, that mischievous nightly intruder evaded every effort to catch. Big glob of whatever-nutritious-enhancer was always gone from the snap-trap, as it seemingly just sashayed from those gluey-supposedly-snares.

Finally, a mouse-trapping-maze was rigged. Glue-traps were set all around heavily-baited snap-trap.

Success at last, the plump invader with midnight supper in mouth sure enough snapped tight into the old-trapping-rigmarole.

Footprints in the glue-traps plain evidence he’d stepped right through only to still get caught. There is always tactic to outsmart wise-old-freeloaders.

However am thinking about inventing an infallible mousetrap. That’ll never happen, records indicate. The world won’t beat a path to the door.

Actually, more than 4,400 patents have been issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office for new mousetraps.

Thousands more applicants have been unsuccessful, making mousetraps the “most frequently invented device in U.S. history.” A vast investment of ingenuity, yet only 20 patents have ever made any money.

Today’s snap-trap mousetrap was invented by John Mast of Pennsylvanian in 1899. Maybe it worked all of the time then, but it doesn’t now. Perhaps indicates mice are getting smarter, humans aren’t.

Reminds of First Corinthians 12:31: “Now I want to lay a better way.” Thus, Hebrews 7:22: “Jesus guarantees a far better way to God; a new covenant.”

+++ALLELUIA+++

XI–21–5-21-17

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