Invaders!

This weekend was so dull that the few things worth writing about are mostly bug appearances. It seems that the rainy season is injecting a new vigor into my visitors, or maybe it is just pushing them into my nice, dry home.

A few nights ago there was a millipede crawling on the outside of my mosquito net when I went to bed. When I woke up, it was on the inside of my mosquito net. This might have been alarming, but I was recently caught describing millipedes as snuggly. Of all of the critters that might make it under the net, this one is one of the least unwelcome, as long as it doesn't try to snuggle with my face or any of my orifices.

I had another spider. It was one my bathroom door, and the similarity of colors made it so it took me a while to notice it. Finding a big spider after having been in a room for several minutes is like suddenly realizing that someone is watching you when you've been doing something embarrassing. Alarming, but not the end of the world. You just wish you'd noticed sooner.

Oh hello there! The flash really captures your leg hairs
quite nicely, don't you think?

Two nights ago I was greeted by a very busy-bodied tiny red and green striped hemipteran. I tried to take a picture, but it was too small and moving too fast. But those red and green stripes packed quite the graphic punch.

Crappy photo of my design conscious invader

Next, a host of psychotic ants seems to have taken up residence in or under both of my door frames. The result is that at certain times of the day, whenever I open my door, hundreds of tiny angry ants stream out and rush around in a frenzy. They cover everything within a certain radius of the door frame, and that tends to include my oblivious feet. In case you didn't know, those are attached to my legs. I don't notice the ants until I feel the now-tell-tale tickle on my legs that informs me that I am being bum rushed by ants at an impressive speed. Commence stomping around and swiping at my legs. Luckily, it doesn't seem like they bite. Also, trying to get rid of them makes me sweep more often.

What with the ants, last night I felt like I was being beset by the plagues of Egypt when I got my next set of insects. I heard a strange but persistent sound outside of my bedroom. Buzzing would be too gentle and rattling too harsh. Actually, razzling would be a pretty perfect onomatopoeia. Anyway, it wasn't long before two of the sources of that razzling sound made it into my room, and proceeded to awkwardly fly around, fluttering against me and any other surface that a good flier would normally avoid. I went to look outside to try and figure out where they came from, and there were about a hundred of them hovering around the light right outside my room. Where had they come from? How many more would make it into my room? It seemed if I attempted any catching and releasing I'd probably let 30 more into my room. The plague! I decided to wait it out. Maybe half an hour later, I'd gotten rid of the two in my room and the razzling from outside was replaced by loud thuds. I went to look again. The bugs were gone! More accurately, they were now covering the floor outside, dead or dying. The thuds were courtesy of a cat, who was pouncing on the ones that still quivered. Apparently several of those were clinging to my door, so for a while it sounded like the cat was trying to break its way into my room.

In non-arthropod news, I ate the pineapple my student gave me. Even though no one else would see it, I went all tropical homemaker on it and cut it in the fancy Vietnamese way. It was whitish rather than yellow, and I was worried that it wouldn't be good, but it was perfect. Possibly the best pineapple I've ever had.

This razzler drowned in the delicious juicy remains of my pineapple

Oh right. And the other big news is that I've started buying tickets for my June travels. Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, here I come!