I have window air conditioners that blow…and not in a good way.  They work to keep the place tolerable, at least to a point, but the monthly cost to keep from living in a sauna is quite high. So I open my windows at every opportunity, especially on particularly windy days and evenings, like it is here now — a storm having just moved through. The problem IS, is that somewhere, somehow, there must be a hole in a screen or some tiny crevice in a frame where all manner of creepy crawlers and buzzing flyers are gaining entrance. I’ve looked at all the windows and can’t SEE any holes in the screens, but something is amiss, otherwise we wouldn’t be living in a frog’s paradise.

Oh, my cat, Shaylee…she makes short work of the larger creeping critters. Being a good hunter of the bug variety, and apparently having no shortage of an appetite for the little buggers, she has a field day, I must say.  Flies are her favorite. It’s actually quite impressive to watch her in action. Awe inspiring to see someone so dedicated to their craft, truly.

But the smaller bugs, and unfortunately the truly frightening ones — the ones that look prehistoric or as though they’ve somehow mutated due to alien interference — THOSE she has no interest in. Maybe she knows something we don’t.

More often than I care to be doing so, I find myself up on a chair, glass or tissue in hand (we catch as many of them as we can and let them go outside rather than just arbitrarily smooshing them), trying desperately to catch a fast-footed whatchamacallit without it springing into defensive mode or simply losing its grip on the wall and landing on ME.  It’s a sight to behold, I’m sure, and I have no doubt my neighbors must wonder just “what the hell is going on over there with all that noise and screaming??”

Knowing my luck, it’s these very same liberated bugs returning over and over again, ungrateful for their shot at freedom…or as I have often dreamt in nightmarish color, perhaps they are rising up, staunchly determined to stage a coup and take over the house altogether.