My husband has a need to be near trees. If he had his way, we'd live on a few acres where it would take some type of ATV to check the mail or visit a neighbor. It only made sense to choose a heavily wooden neighborhood when we began our house search a few years back. Enormous pine trees fill our front and backyards and we back up to a reserve....so you guessed it, more trees. It is beautiful to look at but it comes at a price.
Critters.
They come in all shapes and sizes. Some have fur, most have tails, some have scaly skin, some have wings and sometimes they have fangs. Yes, you read that right. FANGS. But that's for later.
Two Thanksgivings ago, we returned from our Texas Tour to quite a surprise. When we came in the front door, I noticed a few dead red wasps and yellow jackets on our entry floor. No big deal...we back up to woods, remember? Then I proceeded into our living room and looked up to see large groupings of wasps and yellow jackets in the corners of our upper windows and the ceiling. Let me be clear...I DON'T possess a poker face. I think I gasped or maybe called for Tray, still stunned by the sheer numbers in our house. We convinced the boys to hang out in our bedroom and watch some tv while we 'unpacked the car'. Several hours and a few cracked windows later, we thought we had it under control. Let's just say that didn't happen until last year. It wasn't a constant problem, but it didn't totally go away until Tray got up on the roof and sprayed two huge cans of wasp spray down our chimney. Protector and provider...that's my man. And I got to be pretty proficient with a broom and dustbuster.
Just when the boys had gotten over their twitch brought on by anything that resembled the sound of insect wings, we had another visitor, brought to us by opening the damper for the 1st fire of the season.
It's like Ranger Rick around here. This time instead of being the neighborhood freak show who was rumored to have unconfessed sin, we are the totally awesome parents that put the winged friend in our freezer for JT to take to school on Monday. Fortunately, smarter thinkers prevailed and we sent pictures instead.
Would living inside the Loop be so bad??
And no, Nancy, we are not deep frying it for T'Giving, but thanks for the suggestion. That is very reminiscent of Sammy Kershaw, Queen of My Double-Wide Trailer...
23 hours ago
3 comments:
I must say these pictures are AWESOME! The bat I saw was double wrapped in plastic bags, so I didn't get to see all this detail. Great pics!
Wow, I'm impressed with your bravery! We had a bat in our house the first weekend we were here and we called the police, after Jason ran around the house yelling, shaking a window screen at it because that's the only "weapon" we could come up with at the time. I walked around banging the walls for a few weeks after that happened. I did not want to be surprised at all by one of his friends!
That is seriously my worst nightmare, however, Caroline LOVED the pictures!
Post a Comment