Amy, from Somerset, England, writes: "We all have kitty pics, but yesterday we had a little guest brought in by one of our cats that promptly made it's home in our PC. ... It was quite fun trying to remove it, but I think it was quite happy in there."
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I was doing a little work in the back yard yesterday when I cam across a praying mantis. I don't see too many, and this one was a handsome specimen so I took a couple of photos. I also shot a video, but he didn't do much other than lick his foreleg for a while. Maybe I'll upload it later on.... More.
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The secret: It's not the creepy chemical additive you thought. A couple of weekends ago, I caught an episode of the public radio show "The Splendid Table" with soothingly voiced chef Lynne Rossetto Kasper. The topic was BBQ and I was shocked (Shocked!) to hear Lynne* and her guest recommend liquid... More.
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Is that a Microsoft or Logitech mouse?
Seriously, computers make great homes for mice. At the science center I worked at, we had a number of original IBM PCs and PC-XTs, plus a lone Dell 286, that had to be disposed of. Almost every one of them had mice nest in them, and the Dell (which was located in the library, though unused for some time) had an active resident! Not too pleased at the eviction, mind you.
And normally, it's the bugs you need to worry about with computers.
Bit of a tech support tip:
If you're working on a system from a warm climate, be prepared to find spiders when you open the case.
Lots and lots of spiders.
In a semi-related note, gecko inside PC:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/39/96911373_0d34523d8d_o.jpg
It's all well and good to find the friendly critters until you learn that they've used your motherboard as an en-suite toilet.
Not pretty for computing...
I collect old Commodore computers, most of which have been stored in basements, garages, or barns for decades. Spiders and mouse nests are not uncommon, but the animals I encounter most frequently are dust bunnies! :)
You need to introduce mice to reduce your spider population. Then cats.
I had a very similar thing happen to me a few years back, just with a slightly different animal:
http://imgur.com/TKwdP.jpg
Apparently it liked the warmth of the power supply, as this case had about a half-inch of space above the power supply were it could snooze.
In college, I had a mouse problem--it would steal crackers and eat them on top of my keyboard. That was fun enough, but I went away for the weekend and it tried to eat through my keyboard wires. Not a good thing.
PC mouse is watching you.
But really, you need to install the missing card slot covers.
Cutest. Vermin. Ever.
That is pretty cute, but I hope she got the little booger out of there before it peed all over everything or chewed the wires.
Last year when I was trying to fix our middle-aged babysitter's computer, I opened it up and found an entire mouse nest made of lint inside the bottom of the case, with a lot of mouse droppings there and all over most of the components. I had to scrap everything but the drives, and build her a new system.
Way back in the OJ trial/Clinton era, I was a wage slave for the cable company. We had a big problem with roach infestations in our (Jerrold/General Instrument) cable boxes, which always ran rather warm to the touch. I've also witnessed roaches nesting in alarm clocks and other warm electronics in roach-infested homes... so think twice about that swap-meet gear you're thinking about bringing home.
Reminded me of my old Machitosh LC I picked it up and it felt "heavier" so I opened it up and there was a mouse and a stash of enough dogfood to last the mouse for 2 years lol
Ugh...pictures made me squirm. Thank god it wasn't a rat...
Similar story, only with a six thousand dollar HP server. Someone left the expansion card slot off and shipped it to a remote office. two weeks later the server wouldn't post or do much of anything.
Shipped back. Disassembled and found a nice warm corner of the motherboard near the dual power supplies was used as a toilet by a mouse. I hope he got shocked while urinating on the rectifiers.
A couple of years ago we found a mouse in one of our older (tower-style) servers.
This one though, was dead and had been fried to the bottom of the case. Luckily, I was able to delegate removal of the baked-on chap to someone else. Not a pleasant task.
True story: went to Antarctica a couple years ago with a whole bunch of PC gear. I had a laser printer as well. When I got there and assembled the pieces, the laser wouldn't work with real funky messages on the display. The bottom was gooey, so I disassembled it: all the cables were chewed out (I guess that's all it had to do during the 3 months long shipping) and there were plenty of mouse droppings inside. I never found the culprit, but I doubt it liked its new penguin friends...
When I was younger and poorer a kind relative handed an electric cooker on to me, with the caveat 'it doesn't seem to work as well as it used to'.
When I opened it up I found a thoroughly mummified mouse, still firmly grasping the incoming live and neutral in each paw.
It's so CUTE!!!!
When I worked tech support I got a call from someone who was not getting any power to their pc. Opened the case and found a fried rodent that had chewed into the power supply cable to the motherboard.
I think it's a Razer, DeathAdder possibly? You don't need that! Give it to me :l.
after all of this, Is mickey the computer mouse still living well and happy in mouse land? or did he run into the super charged fan? and got all his mouse limbs caught up in the fan? I sometimes sit and wonder. Have a great day!
This is actually how the DJ Joel Zimmerman got his stage name Deadmau5.
And then when you have too many cats, you need to get some dogs, but then you'll have lots of stray dogs...
...so eventually, what do we send after the coyotes?
Aall you have to do is to take the system airblasted with a air can and once in 3 mnths take the system out and clean them.
Man, thats some old technology he has in the computer. =P
"Amy, from Somerset"'s husband here. I can report the mouse is probably alive. After trying to tempt it out and then prise it out with a stick, we left the case outside for a couple of hours. When we came back to it the mouse had gone.
The half a mouse left by our cats in our hallway later, almost certainly wasn't this one. I'm sure the one in the pictures is living a happy life now with his mousey family.
Ok so I had a working Kenbak-1 working condition and i was getting ready to sell it to a computer collecter for 20,000 worth that much and I had just turned it on a few weeks ago so I opened it up and there was a mouse caught in some chewed wire with my kenbak-1 totally destroyed
I hate mice now