December 4, 1991
Dear Everyone:
The
Marabunta have
invaded my bathroom.
For those of you who are not familiar with 1950s
movie trivia, Matabunta the is the native name for the army of ants that tried to
eat Charlton
Heston's South American plantation in
The Naked Jungle,
starring Eleanor
Parker. (Another bit of movie
trivia.: This was one of the last films where Heston took a backseat to
his leading lady in terms of billing.)
Another term for
Marabunta was “600 square
miles of agonizing death!” a line uttered with a perfectly straight face
by William Conrad,
while wearing Bermuda shorts.
In my case, it was not quite so extensive.
A few weeks ago, I noticed a
couple of scouts (ants) in the blue bathroom.
“Uh, oh,“ I thought.
“Time to drag out the ant
killer.”
So I got out the foamy ant-and-roach killer that
you're supposed to spray through any cracks into the inside of the wall
where the ants are. There's this
one particular spot where the wall meets the bathtub but has a little
hole which, of course, is about the size of the Santa Monica Freeway to
an ant. I sprayed foam into it
several times, then sprayed all around the tub just for good measure.
It was several days before I happened to go into
that bathroom again and, when I did…ants!
Hundreds of them.
All dead.
An army of dead ants all over my bathroom.
Intrepid little soldiers who
mindlessly followed orders, not to mention each other, through “the
Forbidden Zone” to get to the Santa Monica Freeway, only perishing
after they'd reached my floor, counter, kleenex box, bathtub.
Everywhere.
Now, if you
have to have ants, this is the way to do it.
Get them while they're dead.
Especially if you happen to have
a canister-style vacuum cleaner with a hose.
All I had to do, besides washing
the throw rug, was to suck all those desiccated, little carcasses up
with the vacuum. Easy.
Except…they kept coming.
Every night, when I get home, I'd
have to vacuum up the new arrivals. “Excuse
me while I go vacuum my bathtub. Won't
take a minute.”
The smarter ones, of course, headed for the other
bathroom. But I was way ahead of
them. When pushed to it, I can
think like an ant. I'd already
sprayed the pink bathroom. So, when the ants arrived, they arrived dead.
This went on for about a week and a half.
It got so I didn't bother putting
the vacuum cleaner away. Then,
finally, they got the message, which was:
“Go visit the neighbors.”
In other news…
Mother and I did decide on the plays for Ashland
next year and I got the order for tickets sent off on November 12th.
“Jeannie” and I spent Thanksgiving in Fresno with
“Marshall” and “Glinda”. We had a
wonderful time and “Marshall” took us on a tour, showing us the famous
Water Tower and the new City Hall, which some people say looks like a
Klingon battle cruiser.
To me, it looks more like a smoked-glass-and-metal
Manta Ray.
Love, as always,
Pete
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