Marc and I didn't expect to have so many little critters living with us when we moved into Cabin C. In fact, only one of them is really welcome, and that's our dear little Sammie (a sandy-blonde mellow rat). Usually everyone has some kind of run-in with unwelcome invaders such as rodents, insects, and pests of all kinds. I just didn't expect them to move into our home all at once...
Honestly, they've been arriving at different times. First, the mice came to feast on our buffet of fresh fruits, dried fruits, nuts, and ALL of my dehydrated camping food (stashed in the closet). You learn, especially after living at the Land for any amount of time, NOT to leave any type of food out that can be chewed through and eaten by mice, because they WILL leave no stone unturned. We quickly determined to shut down the buffet and put all dried goods in mason jars as well as stocking up on mouse traps (sorry for those of you hippie-types reading this who believe in the live-traps...we want revenge on those little guys! They even invade our bed and leave little poops on our pillows; now that's wrong!). All winter long, we've caught mouse after mouse and yet they still haven't learned their lesson. Just yesterday I found one running around in the closet when looking for my old chuck taylors.
When the warm weather arrived, so did the carpenter ants. At first I thought we had 2 species of insect invaders, because the females don't look a thing like ants: they have wings and fly. ick! Marc found some old ant traps around the Land, so we opened up about 18 of those suckers and put them around our bathroom. Then Elena announced one day that she, too, had carpenter ants and that only specific types of traps get rid of them. Even then, you only see about 8% of the entire colony so it often takes weeks to kill the colony. The best thing to do when you're fighting a full-scale attack is simply to vaccum them all up. So, needless to say, our vacuum cleaner has been a permanent fixture in our bathroom for about a month now. At one point, I had a pregnancy meltdown and cried on Marc's shoulder hearing those famous words from Erin Brochivich (in regards to her cockroaches), "Do people really live like this?!" It just seemed too much to be flicking one off my shoulder only to find another on the clean bowl that I just want to eat cereal out of...Is that too much to ask?
And finally, the last, and I think the most exciting new pet that we have is a tree frog. ...You're relaxing in the hot shower after a long day of work, when you happen to peek out of the shower curtain only to see a little green frog on the bathroom floor. Hmmm, must be a prank. "Hey babe, what's that frog doing in our bathroom? Ha, ha, ha..." "I guess he's just coming to say hello." Oh. So he didn't put a toy frog in here to freak me out? Upon closer examination, I realize that this frog is indeed living and breathing, most likely enjoying the way the steam treatment opens up his pores. ...Frogs are a little harder to catch than mice or ants, so he's escaped us a couple of times, but to be honest, I don't think I mind him so much. A frog isn't quite the pest that mice and ants are...
It's a good thing to keep a sense of humor about the little things, and they really are little things.
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3 comments:
You have a lot higher tolerance for those varmints than I would!
Megan, Sam now physically shakes when he sees scary spiders and will not stop reminding me about any weak little random spider or bee or fly even when its in someone elses home. So now i am the defender of the house, becuse even scott is more afraid of spiders than me, so Ed says to Renee the other day. I can just see you soon becoming even more protective of your home when your little bundle arrives. Do you know yet? Boy or girl?
Sad to hear that the mice haven't relocated. Where are they getting in???? If you figure it out let us know because we're still talking about it. Our best guess is somewhere in the bathroom? Our most successful trap spot was between the sink and the window-wall. Ugh...just thinking about them fills my nostrils with the stench of their pee!
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