Uninvited Guests

The new year is upon us, and with it, Tom and I have some uninvited house guests.

These pests answer to the name of Drosophila Melanogaster. They are also known more commonly as... Fruit flies.

Sneaky little bastards!

I'm pretty sure they hitched a ride into our house in a box of mandarin oranges or on a bunch of bananas. And while we've had the occasional fruit fly in the past, they always seemed to die out pretty quickly on their own. We keep a clean kitchen, so I don't think there's much for them to live off of. But these fruit flies have been more resilient, and highly annoying.

In general, I find fruit flies (along with lady bugs) to be one of the least offensive insects. They don't have creepy multiple legs like spiders or centipedes. You can't hear them buzzing around like flies. They don't leave itchy welts like mosquitoes. They aren't spastic like moths around lights and flames. They don't scurry around like ants.

Scurrying is a huge problem for me. Beetles scurry (gross). And even though cockroaches aren't a problem in Canada, they also scurry (double gross). Thinking about ants scurrying brings me back to June 2007 in Australia. I was in Cairns for a friend's wedding, and we were staying in a pretty nice resort/hotel. One day I was enjoying (i.e. gorging) on some gummy candies, but didn't completely finish the bag. I rolled up the bag and put it on my nightstand for later consumption. A few hours later, there was a line of tiny ants marching in and out of the bag of candy. I was like every ant-raiding picnic cartoon you've ever seen! I don't think I ever told Ashley about that... I was sharing the room with her, and it was too disgusting to discuss! Guess she knows now!

Or perhaps the most disturbing example of scurrying...

A few months ago I was doing laundry. I was laying out some sweaters on the floor in our spare bedroom to dry, when I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye. Looking closer, I saw a giant spider sitting on my sweater. Granted, spiders don't get that big in Canada, but this was the second largest Canadian spider I'd seen.

I picked up a shoe and some paper towel. I urged the spider off my sweater, and at the right moment...

SMASH!

I nailed that spider!

But wait!

What were those little things scurrying everyone? I smashed the spider! Didn't I? Didn't I?

It was worse than anything you could have imagined! There were dozens of tiny baby spiders scurrying around everywhere. In addition to the baby spiders, there were also spider eggs. I guess that's why the spider was so big... It was a pregnant momma spider.

I vacuumed that room again and again and again.

It was three days before I could go back into our spare room.

Anyway.. Fruit flies.

Yesterday I was particularly pissed when one retarded little bug decided to commit suicide in my glass of water. Just a few days earlier, another had decided to take a dip in my cup of tea.

Last night I tried to make a fruit fly trap. I left some white wine vinegar in a bowl out on the counter. According to the various websites I've read, usually that works. But this morning the bowl of vinegar was untouched.

I've only seen one fruit fly today. Usually I see about 4-5 of them floating around in confusion. So maybe that means they really are dying off on their own.

These house guests have worn out their welcome.

I just know I don't want to find any more floating in my beverages!