Attack!

Although I live in a fairly dirty part of town, the inside of my house is actually quite nice. There are a few minor things that irritate me (which I will share at some point) but for the most part it is very nicely done.

Unfortunately, my front door is rather shabby... it appears at some point before I lived here that someone tried to BREAK IN. The screen over the windows is missing, and there are screwdriver-esque pry marks all around the window and the door frame.

This isn't my door, but it is so close in quality that I had to use it.

I also have a screen door that may or may not have been damaged in this attempt at robbery. It hangs on a bit of an angle and the bottom comes nowhere near to where the door frame is.

This leaves about an inch and a half of a gap that is open to the world outside and all of its creepy crawlies.

I’ve been having a problem with couch beetles. Since Boyfriend had bought me an air conditioner (WIN!) I no longer had the need to leave my main door open to get a breeze, but these crafty little buggers are finding another way in. Landlord says that he leaves his door open and they are probably coming up through the vents.

I named these teeny tiny bugs couch beetles because they look like miniature beetles (smaller than the eraser of a pencil), and the first five or so were discovered on or near my couches.

The very first one I found on my back while I was sitting on the couch.

Let me emphasize that.

MY BACK.

Gross.

I am prone to mashing these couch beetles with whatever I can find. They deserve it. My house, my rules. I choose “Survival of the Fittest”.

All of these couch beetles (the current count is 42 found and mashed couch beetles) has helped to develop a keen bug paranoia. I feel them crawling on me ALL of the time now. I see these tiny black specks from across the room- arm myself- and go to see if they are mash-worthy specks of life or just dirt.

One night I was attacked by something much fiercer.

It must have come in after I had said my farewells to Boyfriend who was on his way to work the night shift at his job.

The following are the real emails I sent to him.

Hello Boyfriend,

I am writing to you with a sad face today.
I am being attacked by a vicious home-invading bug.
His name is Gzznt.
I'm fairly certain he's a cricket.
Either way, he was all nasty-fly-around-and-scare-me-late-at-night and then he's disappeared before I could mash him.
I think he is hiding in the curtains closest to the door, and when I tried to scare him out (so I could mash him) by smacking the curtain with a dish towel, he angrily screamed GZZNT! which I'm fairly certain was the sound of his nasty wings bouncing off of the plastic on the window.
The sound made me want to throw up.
So I pulled out the couch and tried to pull/shake the curtains (once again to lure him out for mashing) and I didn't succeed. I am not going to be able to sleep tonight for fear the Gzznt will crawl into bed with me while I am sleeping. Maybe up my nose, into my ear, or clamber into my open and drooling mouth.
What if he attacks my kids?!
What kind of a mother would I be if I went to sleep all willy nilly and left my poor unassuming two year old to fend for herself against a creature that is SO fearsome that it has it's own name!?!?!
Not a very good one.
And so, I will be up. Up and awake. In the hopes that Gzznt shows himself to me again, and that *this* time I don't f it up and manage to mash him.

Courageously yours,
Girlfriend

Followed twenty minutes later by:

Hello Boyfriend,

I am victorious!
Gzznt tried to sneak up on me.
Somehow he managed to cross the room despite my acute bug paranoia.
He was lurking on the wall above the microwave when my spidey-senses went off.
"Look to the left!" They screamed.
So I did, and there he was.
Gzznt is a cocky bastard though. He wasn't trying to blend in with crap on the wall, or hide behind light fixtures or the clock, nooooo, not Gzznt. He was spinning in a nasty nasty circle, flicking his legs and wings at me.

So I got the empty box of Fruity Hoops. And an empty water bottle (just in case I needed a smaller faster weapon) and I MASHED HIM!

The he fell behind the microwave stand.

But this was not good enough for me. Nooooo. :D:D:D

I moved the table, and the high chair, and I pulled out the microwave stand and I found him.
With his last breaths he had pulled himself with his one good remaining leg underneath the power bar.
I didn't even hesitate.
MASH! MASH! MASH!

There were guts everywhere!!!

Then, MASH! MASH!

Just to make sure.
Stop twitching Gzznt...
MASH! MASH! MASH!
MWAHAHAHAHA!
Then I picked him up with a specially folded piece of masking tape and threw his nasty ass in the garbage can.

Don't mess with me.

Yours in VICTORY!,
Girlfriend.

This is the closest picture I could find.
No, that is not my hand.
Not a flying hope in hell.