“In summer the empire of insects spreads.”
I should be outside singing, “Oh What a Beautiful Morning. The sun is brilliant, the sky dark blue and the air cool after the rain. This, morning, however, has been hectic. Grace woke me up barking her intruder bark, and I went downstairs to find the irrigation man standing and waiting with my paper in his hand. He needed to finish the job. Meanwhile, I let Gracie out then shortly thereafter went out myself to greet the morning. That was when I noticed the gate was open and Gracie was gone. I immediately called out the troops. Sebastian, my neighbor and landscaper, was checking on the progress of the irrigation and said he’d get her so I gave him the leash. Gracie came running of out of my neighbor’s backyard and ran down the street followed by Sebastian. Both of them disappeared but both surfaced in a few minutes: Gracie caught and leashed. Next, Gracie was a crazy dog running from one inside door to the other. I got up to grab her and noticed her friend Cody had come to play and was outside the front door. I let them both into the backyard, now secured. In a while both dogs were too tired and were whacking the dog door hoping to get my attention. They did, and I let Cody out and he ran home. Gracie is now calm for the first time all morning. The irrigation is set and ready so I’m going to stop for a moment and get more coffee.
I poured the coffee and found a dead moth floating in my cup. I picked it out and tossed it. Bugs on my food stopped bothering me in Ghana. The whole time I lived there bugs were my roommates. Most were fly bys, but my flour was the exception. I had to buy it in big bags because that’s how it was sold, and it took little time for the word to spread. All sorts of insects made the flour their home so it had to be sifted before it was used. Most of the bugs were caught by the sifting, but those that weren’t became part of the dish. We considered them protein.
Today I have a few errands and chores on my docket. I need to change the bed and the cat litter then hit the road to the pharmacy and the garden store. I need to buy the rest of my flowers and herbs, the flowers for the front garden and the herbs for the big herb garden. When I get home, I need to plant the rest of the deck flowers. Nothing’s better than getting down and dirty. That would make my shower the last activity of the day!
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: beautiful day, blue sky, bugs, errands and chores, flowers and herbs, hectic morning, irrigation system, runaway dog, sifting flour, sunny
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June 4, 2013 at 12:20 pm
You are too funny. They are saying the insects will run amok in NJ this summer due to Sandy. Like it’s a difference from any other summer? 🙂
The AC problem was fixed yesterday AFTER the heat and humidity blew out to sea. Guess I’m set for the next heat wave…
And I can tell from your activity level your back is ok…
On the agenda for this beautiful day is a trip to the polling place to vote in the primary. A friend wants to come along as she votes by absentee ballot and has never seen the new electronic voting booths. Its a lot of fun as I think there is only the one place to vote in the whole town and the conversation is delightful. I LIKE to vote, no matter where I am. If you don’t vote you can’t complain….
Am I first, or did I take to long to type?
Waving from Jersey,
Coleen
June 4, 2013 at 1:47 pm
Coleen,
I figure the insects of the world will outlive all of us with cockroaches at the front of the parade.
You’ll use that AC soon enough I’m betting. I’ve already used mine a few times. It looks like you won’t need it this week though. Here it is only in the 60’s today and will go down to the 50’s at night.
I have this on again off gain back pain. Yesterday I didn’t do anything which means my back will be okay today though the bed changing will be a test.
Our primary vote is in a few weeks, and I’ll be there. I love to vote too. Ours are still paper ballots with a black pen. I doubt that will change.
Nope, you’re first!!
Waving back furiously,
Kat
June 4, 2013 at 1:27 pm
Is the outdoor shower up and running for the season yet? (I find this idea a lovely one (if impractical in the city)).
June 4, 2013 at 1:49 pm
sprite,
The shower is turned on but I haven’t yet cleaned it. That will be this weekend. We’ll be having nights in the 50’s this week so I doubt I’ll be using the shower yet so I have time for the cleaning. I suspect spiders will have taken up residence-they seem to every year.
June 4, 2013 at 1:35 pm
Hi Kat,
What an exciting morning! 🙂
Bugs in my food don’t bother me too much either. Unless it’s something I can’t identify like the desiccated spider I found in my bowl of miso soup. It came from the imported dried Japanese mushrooms and I wasn’t sure if it was safe to have a foreign dried spider floating in my soup so I dumped the soup.
Flour, sugar, coffee and other powdery staples all go in the freezer ever since the Great Miller Moth Invasion of 2009. Weevils in the flour is one thing but webs in the flour is just too over the top for me. 😀
It’s sunny with a cool breeze up here. My idea of a perfect day. 🙂
Enjoy the rest of your day.
June 4, 2013 at 1:54 pm
Hi Caryn,
It was an exciting morning indeed. Later my neighbor called to say Cody was loose. He was left outside, something which never happens. I hunted him down and locked him in the yard then called both Billy and Tiffany, his human parents, at their respective schools. I got Tiffany who said the slider was open so I got in the car and brought Gracie along to make her think she was getting a ride. I put Cody into the house thus ending the antics of the morning.
I’m with you on not eating foods with desiccated anything. My flour and sugar are in Tupperware containers which have so far kept away moths. Once I out some cornflour in a container. Unbeknown to me, the flour was already infested. I put the flour in a tupperware container, put it on the lowest bookshelf and promptly forgot about it, out of sight out of mind sort of thing. When I found it again, it had become the final resting place for countless moths-it was disgusting!
I’m with you as today is a perfect day here too.
June 4, 2013 at 1:53 pm
Well at least You weren’t bored 🙂 I hate it when Nova runs away like that even if I know she will return within a few minutes and there’s no traffic to talk about here in the village. Orvar and Hector just takes a walk to a neighbor hoping for a treat and Sune goes to the farm next door and barks at then for a while, thanfully none of my neighbors mind 🙂 🙂 🙂
I stopped worrying about bugs in my food after moving to the countryside 🙂 Sooner or later something will fall down in the pan and it’s no use in trying to get it out, as You say it’s protein 🙂 🙂 🙂
A bit on the chilly side here today but sunny so I don’t mind, keeps the flies calmer and that makes me happy 🙂
I could plant something today but I’ll have a long weekend from tomorrow afternoon so I’ll have all the time in the world later on.
Have a great day!
Christer.
June 4, 2013 at 1:58 pm
Christer,
Nope, not bored at all!! Gracie never returns on her own, and though my street is quiet the one leading to mine is not. The good thing is she generally stays on this street. Only once has she strayed, and that was at 12:30 in the morning so luckily no traffic.
We are hearty folk-looks like few of us mind the bugs on our food! It is a cool day here, and I love it. Fly season here too, and I hate them. They bite and dive bomb you.
I still haven’t left. All the dog chasing didn’t do my back any good so I took something and now I’m ready to leave.
Enjoy your evening and how neat to have a long weekend!
June 4, 2013 at 6:42 pm
I have a feeling Simone will be one of those cats who chases bugs and catches them. Or, she may just look at them as a play toy. Most bugs who dare to fly in the house, I prefer them to die and go to bug heaven.
Waving
Lori Trouble
June 4, 2013 at 8:25 pm
Lori,
I have had bug catchers. The worst was when the cats would get a June bug which they’d then eat. You could hear the crunch. Gross!
The last place I’d want to visit is bug heaven!
Waving right back!!
Kat
June 5, 2013 at 6:38 am
Could be worse Kat and Lori. Friends of mine live in Texas where there are tiny tree lizards that get in the house. When I was visiting, they warned me that I might find lizard remains on the floor courtesy of their two cats.
June 5, 2013 at 9:26 am
Caryn,
Lizards were commonplace in Ghana. I had one that lived on the ceiling which was about 7 or 8 feet from the floor. One day I saw its back legs under a chair and grabbed it. It was only its back legs. My cat had dined on the rest.
June 4, 2013 at 7:54 pm
Our dog continually fins ways to get under the fence and leave the yard. He never goes very far. Our neighbor, whom we have never met or seen recently, leaves his driveway gate open which leads to his backyard which is over grown with weeds. He is an Iranian so we find the dog either in the Iranian jungle or he comes around to the front door and sits on the front porch. One day he surprised us with the carcass of a long dead bird. I had to throw it in the trash but he was very proud of himself. I would never want to eat a bug on purpose or by accident.
The insects will be here long after we have become extinct. The cockroaches survived even hydrogen bombs, so how good can a can of Raid work 🙂
June 4, 2013 at 8:33 pm
Bob,
In an earlier comment I told Coleen I figured the insects of the world will outlive all of us with cockroaches at the front of the parade so I agree with you totally.
I wish Gracie stayed around, but she takes off down the street and loves being chased. it’s a game to her. She’ll avoid me and go to just about anyone else. I call my friends at the end of the street and one or the other will go out and Gracie runs right over to whichever one is there.
Gracie had that run in with a possum when she picked it up and ran. She too was quite proud.
June 5, 2013 at 12:22 pm
Ah, the days of flour weevils and roaches. I remember every once in a while cleaning out the 4×6 foot kitchen in Bolga–roaches by the hundreds came out of everywhere. We never had Tupperware or other containers, so they had a field day. The ultimate insult to us humans was when, if we needed something from the kitchen at night, we had to knock before entering, so they would all return to their hiding places. Those were the good old days.
June 5, 2013 at 12:47 pm
Bill,
I remember so well those roach hunts we went on in the kitchen sometimes just for the fun of it. We’d round up those huge bugs then annihilate them. They were almost as big as a house (maybe a slight exaggeration).
They did get into everything, and I too remember knocking so they’d scurry into their hiding places. You could even hear them
scurrying from outside the door.
I don’t know why we didn’t ask for Tupperware in packages. It was around then. I guess we enjoyed the hunt too much!