To ask for an explanation for wtf just happened? **MNHQ UPDATE: Mystery solved!**

[WeirdlyKind]

I'm seriously creeped out and can't figure out a rational explanation so I'm hoping someone can!

Sitting in the kitchen, eating dinner when a black shape ran past my legs, close enough that I felt it pass. Figured it was my cat at first but when I stood up, she was sitting on the windowsill!

The dark shape ran into the living room where my partner is (he saw it too, because he shouted me!)

It apparently jumped on the sideboard and vanished in front of his eyes. There's nowhere it could go - the sideboard is solid oak on a solid stone wall.

The dog is now going mental at the sideboard like there's something there (if there is, we can't find it!)

I'm genuinely creeped out - anyone have a rational explanation? What the hell did we see?

I'm really sorry.

But it's a rat

Should also probably add that I've lived in the countryside all my life so I'm familiar with rats and mice 🤣

Mice and rats can make themselves much smaller to fit through a gap. I don’t know about rats but I know mice can fit through a hole the width of a biro

Most likely a rat and they can move so fast. I would be stuffing the bottom of the door with towels or something tonight or else not be able to sleep. I was in the garden the other day and not long moved in new building and a mouse ran across the yard when my dog out with me and I was freaked out but it was more scared than me so think it ran off out under the side gate but now am paranoid as once a mouse gets into house so hard to get rid of it. Get something to put down for rats. Least your husband saw it too so you are not going totally loopy.

I'd also go with rat. They're much bigger than people realise and yes they can jump onto sideboards. When I had pet rats even the older fatter ones could easily jump onto the sofa and we used to have to retrieve them from the top of curtain poles, bookcases etc when they were out for some exercise. They could easily disappear behind a sideboard too. We had to 'rat-proof' the furniture and they'd get into gaps that you wouldn't think possible.

I'm obviously only posting to mark my place, but I also vote rat.

It's not a ghost.

I am over invested in your experience OP. I need to know what it was.

A rat. Or a gremlin.

My vote is for ghost cat as you say it was that size. I've only seen ghosts a couple of times and one of them was a ghost cat at a friend's. But I could see its tabby colours.

Badger?

Your cat played a fiendishly slick trick on you and is laughing at you behind that cool exterior.

Squirrel.

Between the two of you I'm
sure you can shuffle sideboard out a wee bit. Not having a skirting's suggests a gap for a rat to go through.

I'm going with a rat. They can get bloody big, they're fast and yep those fuckers will get in places you'd think impossible.

Are you a 'woo' type in general? Surely if it was a rat you would have heard the tip tap on the floors?

I’d say rat. Get a trap, bait with cheap cheese and peanut butter. Dispose of once caught.

Then set more traps - where there’s one, there are more.

Was there noise?

A rat or whatever would still make some noise as it ran across the floor, unless it's all carpeted?

Did it make a noise as it landed on top of the sideboard?

Rat, I live on a farm.. trust me they can jump and slip through the smallest of holes! The dog also going mental is a sure sign.

My cat died last week.

For many years, I used to hear her jump off the bed when I was downstairs.

Each day since she died, I have heard her jump off the bed.

Either I now have a ghost cat, or the noise I heard each day wasn't the cat after all 😁

🐀 Absolute motherfuckers. My uncle used to regale me with stories of what he referred to as a "bitch rat", basically the queen, who was the size of a dog and would leap out at him from grain silos. I still have the occasional nightmare about it.

Sounds like a mouse - something with which I am well acquainted! I suggest you buy a humane mouse trap, bait and wait.

www.buyspares.co.uk/product.pl?pid=1656106&utm_source=google&utm_medium=base&utm_campaign=products&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI3fWQo8T99QIVNJBoCR22DQn3EAQYAiABEgJwBvD_BwE

Can't see anything behind the sideboard and it's too heavy to move!

Just empty it and between the two of you you'll manage to move it. My dog whined, sniffed and scratched at our sideboard for almost a week when suddenly a mouse ran out from underneath the minuscule space underneath it! It was honestly no smaller than a little crack but the mouse was huge!

Not a woo type at all - if anything I'm the opposite and don't really believe it all that!

Walls are solid with no gap. We had the living room replastered recently so it's a smooth wall.

Dog has finally settled down so I'm going to out the dishwasher on and catch up with Call the Midwife!

(oh, and no mushrooms for dinner - just roast chicken and chips!)

Well I'm voting ghost. I never used to believe but my DS tells me that a ghost came into his bedroom and ate his yoghurt while he was in the bathroom so I'm now fully woo.

@blyn72 if it is a mouse or rat, then poor thing is doomed with a terrier and ex-feral cat!