ANTS IN MY PANTS!!

I've only been able to use this phrase once, when my friend Annie and I accidently sat on an ant-pile... and I have to say, that time it was painful (not to mention embarrassing), but this time it's painful on a whole new level: I have ants in my pants.

No, I am not typing while ants crawl around my legs, I have a much bigger problem. We discovered ants in our kitchen first. They entered through a partially open window (the one we use between the kitchen and the grill-- a perfect way to get food and cooking gear in and out!). So we closed the window, and sprinkled ant poison. Problem solved? I wish. The window wasn't as secure as we would have liked. They came in through the window casing. More ant poison, and they started coming in from the other side of the window. We caulked. Still, we'd wake up with little black lines across our counters, leading to the garbage, or a little piece of something we accidently dropped. They got into our butter dish, our garbage disposal (which we thought was a great place for them, but even hosing them down to a garbage disposal doesn't seem to daunt them!); they got everywhere.

I mean everywhere. Mondo went to the bathroom one morning on the other side of the house, and found himself standing on a row of angry fire-ants. You should have seen his foot-- swelled up with little white bumps all over it... ick. These guys are evil. Even in our upstairs office, I am not safe. Lord only knows what they're finding up here, but there are scouts all over, and every time I've forgotten to watch my feet while I work on my computer, I get a new bite. And of course a nice bruise on my knee when I jump from the surprise and pain.

So Sunday was laundry day, and I called my sister while I folded laundry. I thought this would be a safe task to do while on the phone-- no loud noises to distract us, and no real concentration needed for the chore. Poor Erika-- we were having a nice chat when I opened my pajama drawer and unleashed a whole colony of ants! Needless to say, she knew right away that something was wrong. I practiced speaking French. The rest of the conversation was ruined. I nearly cried out of frustration and annoyance-- I had really wanted to have a nice conversation. We talk so little, being across the country from each other, and I ruined the one time we actually got around to doing it! And to top it all off, I have ants living in my laundry! Every single drawer had them, though the pajama drawer was fullest, probably because that's the one that gets disturbed the least...

And it was 10:00 at night, with work looming in the morning, and the only clothes I knew wouldn't bite me when I put them on was the clothes piled on my bed waiting to be put away. I had to put it somewhere in order to sleep, but I couldn't put it in my dresser, because then it wouldn't be safe to wear! I was tired, frustrated, and I wasn't above taking it out on some little creatures. I vacuumed the buggers up. Dumped my drawers on the floor, vacuumed up all the ants that came scurrying out, and vacuumed around the drawer edges where the other ants were hiding. I threw my pajamas all in the washer and started 'er up. Pulled all the drawers out of the dresser, then vacuumed the base (which was black with ants, by the way) and the sides where they were running into cracks of the composite wood. Once I had it all cleaned out, I opened the door, and Mondo unceremoniously dumped it on our porch. It's still sitting there. I haven't the heart to bring it back in.

Fire ants are evil. We are walking ant bites these days. We've tried feeding them with those nice little ant feeders (perfectly healthy for them, I'm sure) but the ants seem to prefer whatever they can find elsewhere. What they are finding is beyond me-- I don't usually keep my cookies in my pajama drawer, or by our toilet in the bathroom... but oh well. The war is on, and I'll eat my shorts if we don't win it. Check out my arsenal-- Yep. Those little biting behemoths are eating their last meal...