a great year for bugs

In addition to swine flu and assorted germie-type bugs, it has been a spectacular year for insects.

It has been cool and wet almost all summer here in Michigan. Apparently, this is great not only for mosquitoes and gnats, but also for ants and wasps and hornets.


All except the paper wasps. They don't like the wet.

As I am busy cleaning the basement, there are flies that have appeared buzzing, big-bellied and BIG over night. The mosquitoes are horrid and have contributed to cutting walks shorter. There are enormous ant hills all over our property-- we only mow around the house, and now we are almost surrounded by ants.

AND... also almost overnight, we spotted a hornet's nest that is about TWICE THE SIZE OF YOUR HEAD on the east side of our house under the eaves at the peak.

I don't care how swelled your head is, it is twice the size. At least!

I spotted it as I was driving away one day and described it to my dh (Dear Husband). He said, maybe we can take care of it... I said, NO! We have to call an exterminator. When I showed it to him, he agreed. It's huge, no lie. One day it wasn't there, and it seems like the next day it was THERE, absolutely huge.


So we called the exterminator. He came out and was doing his thing outside the house. I noticed he was at the front of the house (north side) with his ladder for a bit. When I mentioned it to my dh, he thought it odd too, and he called just to make sure the guy did check the east side. Sure enough, he did check the east side and sprayed the hornet nest and was planning on coming back a few days later -- when the hornets were all dead-- to take down the nest. BUT, he said, I noticed that you had some yellow jackets nesting around one of the corners of the front of your house. I will need to get into the house to take care of that one.

So, we said okay. He came back a couple days later and went and looked in our little pantry in the basement that is right beneath our little foyer. He called my dh down to look at what he had found.

A GIANT YELLOW JACKET NEST! Almost as big as the hornet's nest outside. The guy
said that the species of yellow jackets don't make much bigger nests than that one. He said the hornet nest was the biggest he'd seen this season for that species too. He suited up and sprayed and dusted the nest and he will be back next week to take out both nests.

WHOA.

Once the fumes were gone, I took some pictures.


The white card in the picture with the yellow jacket nest in the pantry is a 3 X 5 index card.

The guy said we were fortunate that the yellow jackets nested in the corner of the pantry. If they had nested in the attic, that size of a nest meant that they would have gotten into and chewed up the dry wall.

strange sightings at the food store.

On a trip through the grocery store in Mississippi, I saw a number of items that were on sale-- that really shouldn't be-- I mean really, at a grocery store?

Patio furniture. Seriously? I can put this in my cart? How do I fit this in my reusable grocery bag?

Then we saw a sofa-bed.

A framed "art" piece of a football player.

I resisted, but have now come to accept, the cookware and Cusinarts, the dishes, dish towels and dishpans. OK, they aren't food, but they are involved in the preparing and serving of food.

I have gotten used to the convenience of toiletries, toilet paper and toilet cleaner being in the store so that I can pick them up while I shop.

But firewood?

End tables (stacking!only $12.99 each with your savings club card!)?

It isn't just Mississippi: these same grocery store gaffs are in Michigan, too.

What I want to underscore here is: this is NOT at the Super-store that tries to be-it-all. This is at the FOOD STORE.

What next? Cars? Computers?

Saturdays

I don't have as many emails, usually, on a Saturday, as so much of the email activity comes from my Jewish women's email list, and many are observing Shabbat, in part by staying away from the computers.

I wonder how working computers qualifies halachically as work? Is maniupulating the electricity making fire?

egotistic quote of the day

I never succumb to peer pressure, because I am without peer.

Mississippi

My daughter lives in Mississippi; I live in Michigan. I have visited her a number of times over the past several years. She has also visited the ol' homestead a number of times...

Probably 90% of my visits to her have been in the summertime. About 90% of her visits to Michigan have been in the cold-weather seasons.

Go figure.

the sh* word

Today I feel that the sh* word is "SHOULD"

As in: I should be doing, I should have said....

For I should be
writing a play that is to be produced in October
writing a syllabus for a class I start teaching in a month
outlining my book(s)
outlining my article(s)
reviewing the text for the class I will be teaching
walking
exercising...

Instead I am sitting and sipping and surfing...

what am I supposed to do?

I am having another of those moments of existential angst.

Or, another series.

I have founded two youth theater groups. Both are still active-- the younger one, for older kids, about to celebrate its tenth anniversary is quite active, the older one, for younger (and older) kids, is about to celebrate its eighteenth anniversary. The older one (for younger kids) has been less active in recent years, while the younger one (for older kids) has been quite active.

None of my own biological children has been in a show in a number of years now.

So why am I still doing it?

I'm not getting paid-- I get an occasional stipend, which would not even cover mileage (if I were to charge mileage).

I believe in the power of young people as artists. I believe in the power of theater to transform lives.

But my faith is being challenged lately.

Since the "poisonous comedy" referenced in 2008, I have had more challenges in the culture of the organizations I have founded. Parents objecting to the material (well, if you don't think your 12 year old should be exposed to Shakespeare, so be it-- take 'em out!).

Young people treating the group as a social club -- to the point that the artistic endeavor suffers.

And young persons and older persons disrespecting me, the material and the process.

This is not what I signed on for.

At the same time, I will find -- in the same production-- that theater, my directing, Shakespeare-- some combination of these-- has changed a young person's life for the better.

All at the same time.

The tentative plan I have now is: meet with the core group of teens. Tell them how much I have been hurt. Tell them how much I believe. Ask them to join me with whole hearts.

Or leave. Leave now. Create your own group!

Or-- I could retire.

2010 could be a watershed year. Either re-invent ourselves. Or make our exits gracefully.