ohh, what a tangled web we weave......

ok, some of you who read this blog may have figured out that i like animals.

i also believe in not killing them and this extends to also not killing bugs unless they are posing some threat to me (stinging, biting, etc.). often, i have them on the "catch and release" program — especially spiders.

as spring has sprung, it seems every species of bug in town has awakened and somehow gotten into my home through some crack. most of these insects are less than pretty. while my first instinct is to whack them, i sometimes stop and think that maybe their little buglet friends will somehow know and come and attack me while i'm sleeping. neurotic, eh? mostly though, i feel wrong about killing another living creature and hope that if i ever came back as, say a spider, someone would catch me and let me go on my merry way (or at least end it all with one solitary good whack ;p).

the past two years, i have been battling wasps. i hate them. i REALLY hate them. they've also made life difficult for me as they built a small nest outside one of my doors, hidden very well. i couldn't understand why i was seeing so many of them until i discovered their papery hive. i very carefully, if not bravely, managed to destroy the nest completely without getting stung. stupid me thought this would be the end of it. it seems even though the nest was gone, they returned and spent the next summer harassing me once again. they didn't bother rebuilding the second time. i put all sorts of chemicals where the nest once was in an effort to try to deter them from buzzing around but to no avail. it made it literally impossible for me to be able to enjoy the outdoors. a few of them, over the two years, had even managed to find their way into my home which was pretty scary. bee and wasp stings are no fun. included in this scenario was a kitten leaping from furniture trying to catch the wasps. luckily, i managed to kill them before either of us got stung. now i am sitting and waiting to see if they come back.

to this, add the eventual emergence of literally billions of "brood XIII" — and while i don't think i'll be affected for geographic reasons, i know their confreres will show up as they do every summer in the trees behind me buzzing away so loudly you wanna scream "shut UPPPP!!

i'll end this by introducing "charlotte" .... a little critter who appeared two days ago and is on the run escaping me every chance she gets (as i think, "G-d, no, don't lay eggs in my house!"). i told her it's either jump in the canister and be released or meet the jaws of death of the cat when i am not looking. you'd think she cared.

charlotte made her appearance the other day by running across my hand when i reached under the computer screen to grab a pen. i, needless to say, was not amused as she proceeded to run across my computer screen and jump on the wall.

i managed to grab a canister and actually got her in it. stupidly, i checked to make sure she was there and she jumped out and ran across my shirt, leaping to the floor and ran away. i found her last night in the livingroom but she darted away before i could get her and now she is playing hide and seek in yet another room.

enough already, charlotte. your days are numbered.

i know i need one of these. (lee valley is a GREAT store).

btw, she is the size of a silver dollar {shudder}. big, eh?