Because so few mice know how to dance.

What’s worse than finding a dead mouse in your office? Finding a dying mouse in your office.

Okay, I guess we can’t blame Mia the Wondercat for this one. It’s the mouse on my computer that is on its last legs. (Or whatever.) The ball inside rolls around just fine, and it’s clean enough, but the sensors that detect the motion of the ball recognize only up-and-down motion, not side-to-side. And since no links or commands are ever lined up directly under the mouse’s location, or straight up or down from it, I now have to get around on the screen with some combination of Ctrl- commands and tabbing. No fun at all. But I’m sure I’ll go out tonight or tomorrow to get a new one.

What’s worse still? Having your cat find and play with a live mouse at 3 in the morning, and she’s enjoying it so much that she wants to share the pleasure with you, so she jumps up onto the bed with the mouse in her mouth, and lets it loose so she (and you) can chase it. (Again, not Mia. That was Sabrina, when she still thought of mice as self-propelled fuzzy chew toys rather than as snacks.)