I'm absolutely certain it was completely thawed. We picked it up from Petco at around 7pm. It was left in a bowl of slightly warm water until we fed at midnight.

My wife says that she vaguely remembers (in hindsight) hearing something many years ago about breaking the legs of a f/t mouse/rat. She keeps beating herself up for not remembering before, but I still can't even find any advice like that in my searches here.

It was hooked right in the corner of his jaw and just would not fold back.