Death-Wish Wish Fulfillment

There are wasps in our attic. At first I thought they were living in the trim where the master bathroom joins to the rest of the house. That was wishful thinking. They are in fact in the attic. I deduced this by watching them slowly piling bits of blown insulation from the attic on the porch roof to make room for their horrific love nest.

The freak snow storm we had earlier this week was probably one of the last appearance of winter for the year. Soon, spring will be here. When it arrives, the wasps will come with it. Now is the time for me to strike.

I've done a bit of research and preparation. Bug-bombs are out and Spectracide aerosol wasp spray are in. Now, all I have to do is make my way into the attic on a cold night, find the nest without drawing too much attention to myself, hose it down with poison, make my way back to the attic hatch (50-60 feet back to the rear of the house) without getting stung or falling through the ceiling. I anticipate this being as much fun as swimming around the Great Barrier Reef with a five gallon bucket of chum tied around my neck.

Later, just for kicks, I can climb onto the roof and plug the hole into the attic.

Season of Slaughter

It's fall yet again, and everything wants to come into the house. I went to Lowe's last night, and, on my way out, I noticed our cat was having a grand time playing with a maimed rat. This rat is the second one he's caught this season. I hope he's killing them all before they find a way into the Devil Queen.

Aside from rodents, we have an on-going wasp problem. There is a gap between where the eve of the master bathroom meets the Devil Queen's main roof. A colony of red wasps has established itself in this crack. When I say "in" mean to say they seem to be pulling tufts of blown insulation out of the crack to make room for their ever-growing nest. I can't begin to tell you how much poison I've sprayed into this hole. I think I've used at least ten cans so far, and, though their numbers are diminished, they are still there.

[The picture is horrible. The specks all over the roof are dead wasps. I lost count after around 40. The brightest yellow area of the eve is roughly where the gap is]

The last round of poison must have been pretty bad. Since I'd slathered the gap with foaming poison, they were driven to find a back-way out to escape sticky-white-death. The poison must be stout, they were desperate. Unfortunately for me, their escape route was through this crack in the master bathroom ceiling.

Nothing like going to take an early morning piss and noticing - mid-stream - that the weird droning was a flight of angry, semi-poison wasp circling the chandelier. Thank God for the cathedral ceiling. Or, thank Scarlet since it was her idea.

So, driven by fear, shifting priorities, the inability to escape linear time, and laziness, the master bathroom has been sealed up for about three or four weeks. Last night, I went in to survey the situation.

I fell like I'm collecting evidence for a war crimes tribunal. There are bodies everywhere, over twenty to be sure. Apparently, the wasps would pull themselves out of the crack and circle aimlessly until they succumbed to the poison or starvation.

Since it was nearly midnight at this point, I decided to set everything up but leave the actual caulking for tonight. Hopefully, I'll finish before Ms. Scarlet makes it home from work.

On the upside, I did finish painting the last four shelves of the living room built-in last night.

The Killing Fields

This warm weather has everything just burning to go. The wasps are all a buzz and building nest under every eve and over the front door. Every evening I kill as many of the little devils as I can, and the next day more have come to take their place. As annoying (and sometimes scary) as the wasps are, this year is a real improvement over previous years. In years past, they'd awake from their slumber and fill the Devil Queen's interior, like 200 in the master bathroom. We've only had a dozen intruders this year and they were handily dispatched.

Last week I started to wire the closet light in Gideon's room. I immediately ran into a snag. Whether the switch was on or off, the voltage detector was going nuts. I took a closer look and discovered and extra set of wire(s?) in the receptacle. Like any intrepid DIY'er I said, "screw this," and found something else to do. Then I called Jack and asked him to take a look, no big deal.

Friday morning, Thera, our cat, woke me up a little before 5 AM.

Usually, I'd have been annoyed if not pissed, but not today. Why? Instead of waking me with his emotionally co-dependent need-me-love-me caterwauling or his feed-me-now-lazy-stupid-biped call, Thera was giving the hall wainscoting his your-ass-is-mine call of the wild. "Weird," I thought, "it must be mice." Then, since it was nearly time to get ready for work, I took a shower and didn't think about it again until that night. That is when I found this in the living room.

Apparently, not only did his ass belong to Thera, but a back leg did too. The big question for me was, "Thera, did you eat the leg or am I going to find it in my shoe or on the couch later this weekend?" Unless I am proven wrong by some grisly, future discovery, it appears to have been eaten.

I disposed of the corpse and gave Thera an impromptu celebratory party, and this was a big deal given the long standing pseudo-antagonist relationship Thera and I have.

Thera's relationship with my wife easily predates our marriage, so we've been living together for a while. Thera thinks I'm a stupid interloper who will leave sooner or later; he thinks he can out wait me. I typically think he's mouthy mooch whose only contribution to the household is mule sized shits. Now, after nearly eight years, Thera has proved me wrong. He is a bonafide mouser. He has earned his keep and is welcome for the rest of his days as far as I'm concerned.

Friday was a busy day. In addition to a finger sized cadaver, I also discovered this.

And, Jack came over and wired everything up in a jiffy. The problem? The electricians had run a ground wire in from someplace else to tie in there, or something like that. I forget the particulars. In any case, no electrocution or fire and there is light so everything is good.

I called Jack to thank him and he asks, "Hey, did you see the dead mouse out front?"

Me: " You mean the one in the living room?"

Jack: "No. There was a dead baby mouse in the front hall when I came over. I threw it out in the yard."

Me: "Really? Wow. Thera has been busy. There was another dead mouse in the living room when I got home."

Thera had been very busy indeed.

Much later that night, Scarlet and I were sitting in the kitchen talking when Thera chased a huge grey mouse across the kitchen floor. Thera was winning though the mouse had spirit. He actually tried to jump onto Thera's face and bite his nose. Thera bitch-slapped the mouse for his effort and bounced him off the refrigerator a few times. The mouse got tired and Thera got bored so we had to intervene before we went to bed. I caught the poor bugger and tossed him outside.

These mice were pretty dumb, not the uber-mice of last year. Until now, I thought that they were pretty clever, staying in the walls since we move Thera in with us. Did they just get carried away with Spring Fever or what? Why else would they come into the house during the day to tangle with the cat?

What can I say, Darwinian Selection at its best?