Thursday, September 2, 2010

Party in the freezer

Having a second refrigerator is not a good idea.   About 2 or 3 months ago, my youngest daughter came in from the garage to tell me the fridge is “not on.”  Well…I figured this was a man-problem.  I ignored it.

A few days ago I actually trekked downstairs to the kid living room.  I try not to do this often; this is their territory and I prefer not to see what it looks like.  I was sorry I did.  There were a bunch of old cups partially filled with who-knows-what.  Lemonade or juice…I don’t know.  What I DID know was that there were fruit flies buzzing around all of them, and yet even more   that were drowned in them.  I HATE fruit flies.  It was gross, but I grabbed the cups and brought them to the kitchen. 

Let’s move on to day two:  I wake up and start in the kitchen.  Gotta begin with a few cups of coffee, right?  Well…I noticed I was swatting my arm at bugs like I was in the jungle or something.  I thought “ wonderful…  fruit flies in the kitchen.”  No biggie; throw away the old banana, right?  Wrong.  There was no banana.  And there was no old peach or no rotten potato.  And there were MORE than a FEW fruit flies.  I was actually dodging them.  This is not a good scene.  My parents were here and I was yelling for anyone who would listen that I needed 10 bucks to go get some Raid.   My mother and my husband were completely against using Raid.  My husband is a chemist and he will not use any of that stuff in the house, and no round-up in the yard. (we can grow GREAT weeds)  Mom said to “vacuum them up, it’s ‘fun.’” 

Well since I couldn’t make my coffee, I went to step two…time to pee.  I went into my daughter’s bathroom and there were fruit flies IN THERE TOO!!!   This is clearly no joke anymore…we were being invaded.  This time I threw a tantrum about getting some Raid.  “Listen, I’ve lived in Florida and we LIVED on Raid, OK?  We’re not gonna die, I’m not going to spray it ON your cereal, or IN your milk but we HAVE to do something.”

Mom:  “Get your vacuum out, that’s what I did at the cabin.”

Fine.  I sucked a few up, and then luckily it was time to go to work. 

The next day, however, I was practically in tears.  They were everywhere. My college daughter came home from school to do laundry and couldn’t even go into our laundry room there were so many you-know-whats.   I VACUUMED FOR 5 OR 6 HOURS.  First in the kitchen.  Then the bathroom.  Then the other bathroom.  Then I had to haul the thing into the laundry room.  Next it was time to start over in the kitchen again, then the bathroom, then the other bathroom.  You get the idea.  No joke.  5 hours.  I had goosebumps the whole time.  It absolutely gave me chills.  (I must say, I did, however, for a little while feel like a Jedi with my big long hose) I had googled fruit flies to see how to get rid of them… bad idea.  It showed them close-up.  They have red eyes!  BIG red eyes.  The internet said to vacuum.  And to find the source.  So I sucked, and I cried, and I sucked, and I called Dave and yelled at him, then I sucked some more, then I called my mom and yelled at her.  She said, “Look for a potato.  There MUST be a potato, you HAVE to find the source.”

So I looked for a potato.  No potato.  I had cleaned and scrubbed every surface I could get my hands on.  Every appliance was sparkling and sterilized.  I had used bleach the first time around, hot soapy water next, and the third time everything got scrubbed I used Lysol.  I just couldn’t keep up and they were not going away.  I called Dave and yelled at him again.  “I have chills!  You don’t understand… I actually have goosebumps having to do this, it’s SO GROSS!!!  If I had a credit card I would get a Hotel.  I WANT SOME RAID.”  (I would have gone to get some even though he said no, but my gas light was blinking)

Well, after the sixth hour of sucking up flying bugs…I noticed that the laundry room had smaller bugs then the rest of the rooms.  Hmmm….  babies!  (Fruit flies can lay 500 eggs at a time, and their whole life cycle is only 10 days)  OK,  I was pretty sure I was on to something.  I called Dave.  
“Dave,  I think I know the source.”  The laundry room has a door that goes into the garage.  The garage is where we keep our second refrigerator.  (The second refrigerator that is “not on”.)  Next I called my mom.  She told me she had put some vegetables in that fridge after my oldest daughter’s college graduation party…three months ago.  Mom wanted me to go out and look.  Heck, no!  I called Dave back.  He needed to come home immediately and look in the garage.  He did.  Yep.  Found the source alright.  He wheeled the refrigerator to the end of the driveway, we went and bought 3 bottles of Raid.  I only looked once.  I saw frozen orange juice in what once was the freezer, and now is party-central for fruit flies.  These flies were now EVERYWHERE outside.  They were even on the outside of our house windows.  I let him spray the Raid.
Today I am only battling around 5 fruit flies at a time.  It helped almost immediately to find the source.  Now we just have to figure out how to get rid of the fridge by the mailbox.

1 comment:

  1. next time call your neighbor and friend who owns a pest control company.....wink wink!

    ReplyDelete