I'm so glad you are back. I hope you had a fantastic holidays as well and may you too, be blessed with a Happy New Year.
I did the rats especially for my wife and daughters. We had chickens for about ten years and sometimes they would attract mice. Once the mice got into the house, the game was up. The chickens had to find a new home.
Mice and rats don't scare me as much, but tell me a scary ghost story and I'm done. I fall apart for weeks. Can't handle spooky at all!
Mice, rats and horror stories are on the same level for me. Though, while the fear for the former only last until the moment they're gone, for the latter, it appears whenever I have to go out alone at night. Only when the story fades in my memory, I can walk comfortably at night... And yet, in dark places that memory suddenly pops into my head :))
This is really funny to me. Just last night I was talking with my brother-in-law. He is an avid sportsman and goes out into the woods probably 5 nights a week. He often takes his big, burly friends with him, who think they want to go out with him. He was telling me how often these big, tough guys fall apart in the dark woods.
Just a couple weeks ago, one of his friends went with him. This guy is about 6' 4" and 240. All muscle and toughness. He got so scared, he was rolled up in the fetal position, basically crying, in the woods. My brother-in-law had to almost carry him back out.
Funny how the woods and the dark bring out some primal fear in all of us, no matter how tough we think we are.