Infestation

This afternoon, I went outside to apply a quick coat of spray paint to a little project I'm working on, and, as I walked back in, TheGeorgeF brought the swarm of wasps that were buzzing about the kitchen to my attention. It seems that, in the short time I left the sliding glass door open, about eight wasps had made a swift entry. So, we quickly closed the door and took what action we could. I still had a small mask (similar to those worn by any sane person who might be doing a little light sanding or painting), and I felt that was protection enough. TheGeorgeF grabbed a heavy winter jacket (even though it was 90 degrees outside) and wrapped his face with another t-shirt. We each grabbed one of the industrial-sized (1.33 gallon) containers of indoor/outdoor pesticide we have in the kitchen, and, after a short countdown for synchronization, unleashed a hurricane of insecticide (I don't know if the terms "insecticide" and "pesticide" are interchangeable, but that's irrelevant at the moment).  In a matter of seconds, we managed to take out a couple that were part of the congregation in the window above the sink. As that seemed to be where they had chosen to take their last stand, we worked the trigger of those spray nozzles as rapidly as we could. In all of about two minutes, we had taken care of all eight of the wasps we were able to track down in the kitchen. So, we looked through the sliding glass door at the rest of them (it felt like there was a whole battalion out there), and we tried to figure out why they had, all of a sudden, taken such a great interest in our doorway. As we looked up, the reason for this insanity (trying to get too close to our cherished breakfast nook) became evident. It seems that, about five inches from the doorway, they were building a new nest. We knew this could not be allowed to progress any further and that we had to be the ones to stop it. So, in a tactical decision to avoid allowing more wasps into that doorway, we chose to exit through the garage (at the other end of the house) and come around to mount our assault on the mothership construction crew. When we got there, there was no shortage of drones, but we were not discouraged. In unison, we brought back those quick trigger fingers and unleashed another storm of insecticide directly on the nest. This did not please them in the least, but that would not shield them from the destruction they had brought upon themselves. After a brief time, my container ran out of juice, and I was forced to chuck it to the side (I did not realize how quickly I dismounted from that trigger until, upon the dust settling, I saw it laying on it's side with the nozzle about a foot away), and we proceeded to attack. TheGeorgeF transitioned to the hose, his secondary weapon if you will, and I took over the controls of his bottle of insecticide. We scoured the back area of the yard until we felt we had done what we could to hold back their advance. We knew that we were not armed to eradicate them completely, but we felt confident that we had limited their advance to a sufficient extent to grant us some peace and safety until we could acquire some more powerful control measures.

Now, all of that was exciting to say the least, and it reminds me how we, as humans, have a tendency to take over any populated area (populated with other people, animals or insects), call it ours, expect them to leave, and feel insulted and attacked should they ever show themselves. That would be a great lead-in to a paper on the politics on invasion and colonization (foreign lands, Columbus, the whole shebang), but that's not what I'm about to do (it's just a blog, and I'm trying to limit the amount of written political content no matter how present it might prove in my thoughts and examination). I just felt like telling a quick story about something that happened to me today and post it up for some light reading and post to fulfill my felt necessity to post every day. I would have taken some pictures for documentation and proliferation of the tale (an image of the bottle of Home Defense Max laying on the ground would have felt like the perfect fit), but there was no time. Our priorities were elsewhere, and I must simply attach an image of a wasp from Bugaboo Pest (link below) as a sort of graphic to preface the tale.

In other business, TheGeorgeF and I have recently become aware of some past damage to our front door (image below) that puzzles us to say the least. Though it was patched over (poorly), it's evident that something impacted (or pierced) the door from the exterior, and we can only guess what that might have been. Being quick to imagine the most interesting and exciting possibility, we think it looks like a gun shot (don't worry, mom, this neighborhood is insanely safe), but it's in a very odd place on the door (right near the edge). Would that explain why our rooms became so conveniently available? Man, that would be a conversation piece. In the end, we have no idea what truly caused it, but it's fun to find a story to every little part of your life and home (much as the wasps), and I'll leave it at that and open, of course, to comments.

Links:
Bugaboo Pest: Website