infestation

Spring is here--wherever here is. And with it comes all sorts of breeding and feeding. For the cottage, that means ants. I scared both my mom and sister about the mice, but I've seen neither tail nor poop since I cleaned up the bird seed. Instead, I've found dozens, possibly hundreds of ants and have summarily disposed of them. Isn't that just about the nicest way to say "killed them by squishing"?

Tonight was no different. After spending the evening fasting from video entertainment--Lost, Netflix, whatever--I sipped on a couple shots of Absinthe. I remembered that I've been forgetting to remember lots of things and so made a couple lists while listening to Kid A and Amnesiac by Radiohead, finishing off the evening with Gorecki's 3rd Symphony. If you don't know that last piece, you should. [And you should introduce yourself to it by drawing a bath, lighting some candles, and piping it through your Böse Wave Radio. Or just through a nice stereo. It's rather low, so any computer speakers or cheap boom boxes will not do it justice.]

After taking a stroll through memory lane, wistfully remembering who came after whom, and after nearly falling into a sort of hypnotic sleep, lulled by Gorecki's sad songs, I made my way to the kitchen to tidy up before bed. Somehow or another, I picked up the honey jar, which had attracted a half dozen ants--the big fat black ones--into its crevices, hoping for one sweet lick. Summarily killed. I get no pleasure out of feeling the squish--far from it. I'm not a bad person.

I took a bike ride in the evening after spending most of the beautiful day cooped up in a room with a view and an open window. I think I got a tan somewhere between reading my "biography" of Chicago and riding my beloved fixie.

Tomorrow's back to Chicago. Dinner plans tomorrow night. Will probably run into Ashleigh, who is back from Montréal, on Saturday. Someone remind me to bring her phone charger with me. And giving some bike tours Saturday night and Sunday afternoon. It's like a weekend, but it's more like work.

First it was the Watchmen; now it's Lost. I am filling my head up with drama, human drama. But in each case, there's something else going on - little puzzles that reveal themselves, giving the experience more depth than just entertainment.

So far, the Watchmen achieved greater depth than Lost. But, again, I'm only in the early stages of my journey through Lost. It's interesting to see how each experience changes my awareness of the real world. For instance, there are all sorts of themes and parallels tying together each episode of Lost; there are even more details woven together in Watchmen. Suddenly, I start noticing details connecting in life.

Today there was a sudden influx in the number of ants in the cottage. I think the culprit was some sticky buns that my mom left for me on the counter. Ordinarily, I would have eaten them the first day back, but the weekend ended with massive amounts of sugar, leaving me disinclined. I've discovered ants in the cottage before - one or two each week - but today I must have killed almost a dozen. They're not the little, annoying ants but the big black ones. Nice and slow. Not too hard to take care of. But I've disposed of the sticky sweetness and wiped the counters down. I'm not a big fan of killing insects - the Jains believe they could be your great-grandfather making amends - but what else to do with ants in the house in the middle of winter? Build them a solarium?

All this reminds me I should get back to reading Walden, which I put down last weeks ago. He had a much different relationship with ants, one that I could maybe learn from: not how to deal with ants but how to look at them.

As if to prove their point, an ant just crawled across the bed. This seems to support the theory that the ants are just bored, exploring the house for fun. Or they have that parasite that makes them do crazy things, like the parasite that infects a mouse's brain making him fearless and eaten by a cat - which is where the parasite wants to get. I guess in the ant's case it's a fungus.