Mosquito and Meatballs

I don't care if they are sacred creatures of the earth and I'm supposed to be kind to them, they have never and will never show an ounce of respect for my body. They mosey right over, take what they need and then off they go in search of their next victim. No, I'm not referring to your last blind date. I'm talking about those nasty little biting nuisances called mosquitoes.

While I realize that no one particularly likes mosquitoes, let me just say that I loathe them. And if you know me, you know it is unlike me to loathe any living thing (with the exception of big hairy spiders that have the nerve to come within three feet of me). In fact, just yesterday I was cleaning up the backyard and came across a little brown snake, no thicker than a pencil and about ten inches long. He looked so harmless and (dare I say it?) cute sitting there motionless, waiting patiently for me to put back the garbage can from where I had so rudely removed it.

But while I was doing aforementioned yard work, little did I know that I was slowly being sucked dry by blood sucking little creeps! I didn't find out until twelve hours later when I woke up in the middle of the night, itching so violently that I had to get up and tend to thirteen bites, many of which were swollen to the size of a nickel. In the morning, I awoke with a mission - I'm going to kill every last mosquito on this planet, or at least in my yard. I will not be forced to enjoy my North Carolina BBQ within the confines of my house!

Known to all as the Google Queen, I got to work and through my research I found that mosquitoes are repelled by an assortment of smells, most of them essential oils like sage, rosemary, eucalyptus, peppermint, lemongrass and, of course, citronella. These are great for applying directly on your body, but I was looking for something on a grander scale, picturing myself covered in mosquito netting from head to toe wielding a power sprayer filled with some botanically-correct concoction. Mosquitoes will fear me. They will tell all of their mosquito friends to stay away from the big white duplex on Ward Street.

I came across a forum discussion regarding the use of natural methods to keep pests away with garlic pepper tea. The "tea" is a mixture of two garlic cloves, two hot peppers, a bit of vegetable oil and dishwashing soap, blended together, mixed with water and then sprayed all over the yard. This is exactly what I'm looking for! Apparently mosquitoes don't like the smell of garlic. I never did find out what the hot pepper does, unless it's intended to make their tiny noses burn and foreheads sweat. I wonder if they prefer restaurant style corn chips or Tostitos rounds.

Even though I researched and read reviews on an assortment of sprayers at Home Depot and fantasize about wearing my bright yellow dishgloves and waders, the thought of chopping up all of that garlic was a bit discouraging. Luckily I come across www.dirtdoctor.com - Natural Organic Living and Gardening. Self proclaimed dirt doctor Howard Garret explained that spreading minced garlic all over your lawn will kill adult mosquitoes and effectively keep them away for 25 - 30 days. One reader wrote commented on purchasing a large container of garlic at Sam's Club and it being the only thing that worked in his small yard during mosquito season. Reading on I found that we humans only smell it for an hour or so, then it's only detectable by mosquitoes. Perfect!

$17.89 and over seven pounds of granulated garlic later, I'm ready to do this. I put on long black pants and a dark long-sleeve shirt (the little buggers are attracted to light colors), poke holes in the top of the container of garlic with a screwdriver and practically skip down the back stairs to commence sprinkling.

The garlic shakes out well and I cover the ground with a fine layer of seasoning. The smell gets stronger as I go and eventually I'm breathing in a continuous fog of garlic. Suddenly craving spaghetti, I stop and strain my ears in the hopes of hearing tiny little mosquito screams.

Mosquito and meatballs, anyone?

Bugged

In case you haven't heard, everything grows bigger in the south (including my hair, thanks to the humidity), and the bugs down here are no exception. Our first encounter was the day after we arrived while storing some items in the garage/basement (yes, they are one and the same, our house sits on top of the garage which is built into the earth). We open the door to the cool, dark garage and out of the corner of my eye I see what looks like a large spider scurry and hop across the cement floor. But before panicking, I take a good look at the thing and I can see it's not a spider - it has the body of a spider, but it's legs are more like that of a grasshopper or a cricket. Light brown in color with tortoise shell markings, its little antennae move back and forth trying to adjust to the bright light we just let in. Definitely not a spider, but what is it?

Curious and feeling brave (my bug-a-phobia appears to largely apply only to spiders) I walk over to get a closer look and just as I lean down to within two feet of it, it jumps half that distance right up in the air and straight at my face! Naturally I scream like a little girl while Nicole laughs and I decide I've had enough of mystery bug for one day and close the garage door.

Thanks to a visit from our landlord that evening, we learn that the mystery bug is commonly called a "cave cricket." Like its name implies, it primarily live in caves, but some do find their way to cool dark basements like ours. Further research told me that they are not from the same family as crickets and are found on every continent on the planet. According to Wikipedia, "Cave crickets have very large hind legs with 'drumstick-shape' femora and long, slender antennae. They are brownish in color and rather humpbacked in appearance, always wingless, and up to two inches long in body and 4 inches for the legs." The most interesting fact about cave crickets is since they live in deep dark caves where nothing else really exists, they often go for long periods of time without food and have been known to eat their own extremities. Next time you tell someone you're so hungry you could gnaw your own arm off, think of our little cave crickets and be grateful you aren't really doing just that!


My mom and I used to sing "La Cucaracha" together when I was young, but it wasn't until high school that I found out that we were singing about cockroaches and it wasn't until last week that I became more acquainted with them then I care to be. See, down here, we have "palmetto bugs", which is just a really nice way of saying "a cockroach the size of your head." They are huge, they are fast and they are everywhere at night. Returning home from the evening, they scurry from the porch light. I even saw one run across the road and I was standing at least ten feet away. Yeah, they're THAT big. And apparently quite abundant. We noticed what looked like very large ant traps in our kitchen and closet downstairs when we moved in and later realized they were cockroach traps.

We have yet to see one in the house (I'm furiously knocking on wood) but I know that it is inevitable and I'm bracing myself for it. I've seen horror stories of them scampering across people in their sleep. Someone even started a support group online for those who are deathly afraid of palmetto bugs. I may sign up.

By the way, I hear mosquito nets make GREAT Christmas gifts...

Oh, speaking of mosquitoes, they aren't necessarily bigger down here, but they are insanely voracious. The night we unloaded the truck and walked around the yard with our landlord, I ended up with 31 mosquito bites, all from the knee down! And when I get a mosquito bite, I might as well have poison ivy because I itch constantly. I tried calamine lotion, rubbing alcohol, Benedryl pills and creams - nothing worked.

Finally I went to Whole Foods in search of a natural remedy and as I'm looking at the various creams and gels with ingredients like tee tree oil and calendula, an employee walks up with a customer, grabs one of them off the shelf and says "here, this should do the trick." I glance over to see that the woman's legs were completely covered in bites like mine. Grateful for the gel the employee picked out she remarked how miserable she was and how she was up half the night. I immediately turned to her and said "me too!", had a bonding moment right there in the homeopathic medicine aisle, grabbed the same recommended gel and went home with high hopes. And you know what - it worked! Cooling and refreshing, I slabbed it on every two hours on the nose and managed to get a decent night's sleep. Although it was days before I was completely itch free, I highly recommend Bitecare Gel by Boiron. The calendula in it acts as a healing agent, they echinacea relieves inflammation and the ledum palustre (whatever that is) relieves pain and itching.

An Overwhelming Load

Waking up from our first night camping in our new home, we set out in search of what will prove to be our savior, our mecca, our shining beacon of light also known as Super Target. Seeing as the closest one to those of you in Michigan is in Indiana, you may not understand what Super Target is or why I sing its praises. Unfortunate. Why wouldn't they have Super Target in Michigan? I'm imagining little border patrol men armed with bazookas and shopping carts and big red Ms on their chests, defending the land of Meijer...

Not that I'm knocking Meijer. I was worried I would miss the convenience of one-stop shopping and low, low prices, but we were saved by the big red shiny Super Target. We already knew how amazing Target was. Take that and add to it amazing produce and groceries and their organic products from Archer Farms. (If you haven't tried the blue corn chips with flaxseed, you're really missing out). It's fun for everyone!

Proud of ourselves for finding our way there (with a map, NOT a GPS system, thank you very much!), we loaded up on some necessities and headed back to the house for some major cleaning. Not that the place was entirely filthy, but there were certainly some overlooked spots (the fridge is actually white! who knew?!?), almost all of which we cleaned with a bottle of vinegar left behind by the previous tenants. If you don't know the cleaning power of plain 'ol white distilled vinegar, let me tell you - that stuff works. Yes, I see a blog devoted to vinegar coming very soon...

Mom and Dennis arrived around 3:00pm with the bulk of our stuff in the truck and as we ate lunch on the back deck we pretended not to be completely exasperated by the task of unloading what took us four hours to load. Yet another downfall of not hiring movers and moving to a state where you know exactly two people - one of whom was back home visiting in Michigan, the other busy finishing her last week of PA school. Nicole emailed a desperate plea to her soon-to-be-classmates, whom she's never met, hoping to appeal to their good graces and desire to come meet some people who are also new to the area. She got a few bites, but not many and hardly any were definite.

I had been introduced via email to a friend of a friend of a friend who lives in Durham, Steve, also a Michigan transplant, who I regularly tried to bribe on facebook with promises of Oberon beer and Faygo Rock N Rye to come help us move. We had plenty of facebook messages going back and forth in which he assured he would come help, but you never really know with people you've never met. Luckily, Steve turned out to be a SAINT. Not only did he get out of work early and call me on his way over to see if we needed anything, he helped us unload for two straight hours and even brought us a "welcome to Durham" bag full of local products like apple butter, wine, and pickled okra. I happily handed over the Oberon and Faygo!

And not only did we have Steve, but five others from Nicole's class showed up to help! Together we unloaded boxes and furniture, amidst conversations centering around "where are you from?" and "when did you get here?" We were exhausted, yes. We were soaked with sweat, yes. But we were carried on by the generosity and camaraderie of those around us whom we'd only just met.

"Welcome to Durham", indeed!

Arriving in Durham

After four grueling hours of loading the truck and 12 long hours of carvanning down I-77, (Nicole leading, myself and the cats dutifully following) we pulled up to our new home in Durham. The drive was mostly, and thankfully, uneventful. The occasional inquisitive cry from Cessna, our calico, and the jamming road trip tunes emanating from my speakers were the only sounds to be heard as we coasted by small Ohio towns and winded through the mountains of Virginia and West Virginia where we saw signs for "Jesus' Camp in the Hills" (quite different from Jesus' Camp in the Desert, I'm sure) and "Outdoor Drama" (thanks, but I like to keep my drama indoors...)

Eventually we crossed the North Carolina line, where at that VERY instant, my iPod rang out with Melissa Ferrick's "North Carolina." I'm not making that up. Just one of many signs that we took as proof that we are where we are meant to be.

"...a mile and a half off the tracks in Raleigh, North Carolina, with my foot all jammed up from driving 14 hours and my body can't sit upright..." I know how Melissa feels...



With just enough time to get the cats and our clothes inside the house before dark fell, we sat cross-legged on the hard wood floor of our new living room, feasted on burritos and tacos from Chipotle (one of the only places we knew how to get to that was open so late on a Sunday night) and grinned at each other in disbelief. Are we really here? After months of fears and worries, of laughter and tears, of second guessing and excitement, we did it. Holy crap, we actually did it!

With the magnitude of the move and the work yet to be done not quite sinking in, we blow up the air mattress and camp for the night in this undiscovered wilderness that is our new home.