March Madness: A Tale of Two Vermin

Reader, while you're all caught up with your brackets and your sweet sixteens, I'm dealing with some March Madness of my own: vermin. I have lived with dogs and cats my whole life so have weathered multiple flea infestations. Which is why I was so sure when I woke up a few weeks ago covered in welty, itchy red bites that they could not possibly be fleas. I had never seen a flea in my house or on my cats. No crazed itching, no hot spots. No sign of flea dirt, anywhere. My conclusion: BEDBUGS OMG.

Having worked in congregate living settings over the years I know how difficult and expensive it is to get rid of bed bugs and if I had them, I wanted to start treating immediately. I called the building super and asked, possibly demanded, that he come over to inspect right away.

Later that evening, I saw a note on my kitchen table that he had seen two fleas in the area between my kitchen floor and dining room rug. He said he killed both of them and left them on said note for my viewing pleasure, but there were no dead bugs in sight. The Walking Dead: Vermin Rises.

Immediately, I flea combed both cats and found not one flea, not one piece of flea dirt. Nothing that looked like an egg. I called the vet and asked if it was possible to have fleas without ever seeing a sign of said fleas? Reader, you know she laughed. Of course it is!  But not to worry, we see this all the time. Come into our office right now and buy some incredibly expensive Advantage! Also, vacuum your house sixteen times a day until you die and wash everything in your house and then askdkasfkjagfljsDVBNS.jkfg.sdgf/sjDFH.SHdf

We are closing in on week 3 of Operation: Die, Vermin. I have vacuumed every day (if you know me, you know this is BANANAS), dutifully popping the vacuum bag in the freezer between vacuums. I have washed everything and those things I couldn't wash also went into the freezer. Hello, wool throw blanket that now smells of stale ice and frozen chicken! Still no sign of a flea. I think I can stop but then I see things like this that scare me into continued vacuuming: During the flea cycle only about 5% of fleas are actually living on your dog or cat. The other 95% of fleas (in one stage of the flea life cycle or another) are living in your house.

Reader, you must be thinking, Professional Critic has gone around the bend. I would stop all this nonsense by now! And I would, except I have withheld some slightly disgusting information about the impact of these fleas bites. Here it is, since you asked: I had a patch of bites on my upper arm, maybe six or so, very close together. I must have scratched them in my sleep and didn't realize they had opened and were draining the whole next day. By that evening, my arm ached and I could feel how hot it was through my shirt, which didn't seem like a great sign. I was also feeling a touch queasy and shivery. I went into the bathroom and discovered my shirt was glued to my arm with pus from the elbow up, when I gingerly peeled the shirt off my skin, my entire upper arm from the elbow to the shoulder was hot, red, lumpy and hard. Since the shirt I was wearing was brand new, the whole area was also blue from the dye. If there weren't a hundred people sitting right outside the bathroom silently meditating, I'm sure I would have screamed in horror.

Long story short = I'm fine. But, twenty days later my upper arm is still lumpy and itchy. Yes! So that, dear Reader, is why I am still vacuuming, in hot pursuit of invisible fleas.

When Encountering a Passed Out Girl at a Party: A Guide

Reader, in the aftermath of the Steubenville rape trial an alarming phenomenon has come to light. Some young gentlemen have a very narrow view of the options before them when encountering a passed out young lady at a party.  Here's an example of a post-verdict tweet from such a young man, charming Josiah:  



I've been in the presence of several passed out women over the years and managed to not rape any of them. Not to be a braggart, but maybe I should toot my own horn a bit since this is apparently a rare accomplishment! In fact, I did better than not committing even one rape: I didn't film myself carrying around anyone unconscious, or joke about urinating on her, or send her intimidating texts after the fact to scare her out of reporting. But since Josiah has alerted me to what "most people" would have done in this situation and that perfectly normal rapey response can "ruin" a promising sports career and necessitate registering as a sex offender, I compiled this handy guide. Hang it on your refrigerator, or put it in your wallet or car--anywhere you might encounter a passed out young woman.

Things To Do When Encountering a Passed-Out Young Woman at a Party That Don't Involve Raping Her

1. Check to see if she's breathing.

2. Call 911 if she isn't.

3. Find her friends to take her home.

4. If #3 isn't an option, call her mom/dad.

5. If that isn't an option, call the most sympathetic mom. Maybe your own mom! Preface it like this: "Mom. I'm sorry to be calling so late, but I'm at a party and there's a girl who's in trouble and I think she needs help. Can you please come?"

6. If those options won't work, get her out of the way and turn her on her side. We all saw Breaking Bad, right? Don't be like Walt.

7. Put a blanket on her.

8. If you can't bring yourself to do anything actively helpful, how about just doing nothing? This is preferable to perpetrating harm. 

Some might call this guide "common sense." Others, "being a decent human being." Perhaps, but these things are rare, as we are learning today. Hopefully not as rare as Josiah would have us believe.

The Worms Ate My Garbage!

I am about ready to harvest my first batch of worm poo, or "castings" as the vermicomposting community so delicately calls it. Tonight I spent some time digging through the bin--the pile is greatly reduced both in volume and weight--and picked out the few easily identifiable items they have been avoiding for the past few weeks. They don't seem interested in the really hard part of anything: the woody bottom of Brussels sprouts, the rindy part of the banana that you hold onto when you peel it, chunks of red cabbage. Tea bags, which was a surprise, but these were completely intact.  Citrus rinds, which I knew better than to include but did anyway. They molded immediately and I took them out. The leaves attached to a tangerine. Coffee filters, though I probably didn't tear them up into small enough pieces. Perhaps if I just didn't feed them anything else, they would eventually eat these things but I have a backlog of delicious compost waiting for them so we're all going to move on with our lives.

The colony has grown like gangbusters. Not like horror movie amounts of worms, but very noticeably more than when I started. Visible evidence of bebe worms, too--tiny skinny pale things. I've pushed everything over to one side of the box. Within the next few days, I will put a pile of food on the opposite side. In theory, they should slowly migrate over to the food side, so I can scoop out the castings and gift them to my friends the Urban Farmers to make gardening magic.

What It's Like to Live Here

I'm at the kitchen table, working on the computer. Gus is sitting on the kitchen table as well, about four inches away. It is critical that he stay close so he can periodically lean in to gnaw on the corner of the laptop. Or, he may need to stand on the keyboard after using the litterbox, so he can waft poop air at me while sending garbled tweets.

Tonight, I have put my flavorless, chewed-up gum on top of my notebook on the kitchen table, as I could not possibly walk 3.25 steps to the garbage can. With laser focus, Gus identifies the gum as his new toy, batting it around the table like a tiny soccer ball. Eventually, he spears the balled-up gum with his claw, looking very pleased with his catch. But when the gum invariably sticks to him, he panics and starts wildly flinging his paw in the air. The gum flies off his paw and sails in a high arc into the livingroom. Where it disappears, possibly forever, or until we move and I find it embedded in the rug.

Important Things, Naturally

What it is, reader.

1. Though I didn't think it was possible to like Bradley Cooper less than I do (no, seeing Silver Linings Playbook didn't help AT ALL. That Oscar nom is so shockingly undeserved) today I read this little nugget in Jezebel that caused me to run screaming for the brain bleach: "... during sex, Bradley Cooper talks nonstop in French..." Lord, help me.

2. I only just realized, after a Twitter kerfuffle broke out between writers Goldie Taylor and Joan Walsh over a misquote of the former by the latter (article here), and only after it was pointed out by two different writers, that all of Salon's political writers are white. This is a site I read almost every day! How did I not even notice this? White privilege, that's how. Resolution: pull own head out of own ass, more often.

3. Did we all hear that Saturday US Postal Service delivery is ending in August? Are we okay with this? I think I am.

4.  I suck at keeping salad ingredients in the house. Lettuce is a huge pain in my ass, even the pre-washed bagged kind. The greens invariably turn to revolting, stringy liquid in my refrigerator yet I still crave a cold, crunchy and healthy side for sammies. My salvation? Red cabbage slaw, the perfect salad for lazy mofos. Here's what you do:

1. Start with a tupperware the appropriate size for the finished salad. You are making the damn thing in the storage container, friend! I use a 5 cup container and can eat this over 4-5 days.
2. Fill the container about 2/3 full of chopped red cabbage. If you're using a 5 cup container, this is about half of a smallish red cabbage. The way you chop it is important--if you keep the pieces long and dangly, they will fling dressing all over your shirt as you eat. Learn from my experience and don't do it like that.
3. Grate a medium-ish carrot right into the container. That's right, plunk your box grater right over the pile of cabbage and grate away.
4. Add olive oil, balsamic and salt. I do not measure. Use your God-given senses. Mix it with a fork. Hopefully, you heeded my advice about not overfilling the cabbage otherwise there's a mess all over your kitchen counter right now.
5. Finally, and this step is critical for maximum deliciousness: addition of toasted sesame seeds or toasted pine nuts. You must toast them. Do not think of not toasting them. You know I would not take this step if it didn't make a huge difference, right?  Here's what you do: grab a handful of sesame seeds or pine nuts. Spread them on a piece of foil lining your toaster oven tray. Press the "toast" button. Don't let them burn. Let them cool. Dump into salad.
6. This salad gets yummier as it sits and since it is not princessy lettuce, go about your business.
7. I assume this is really good for you though I have never checked. Too lazy.