From bugs to Beowulf
Why can I sometimes putter around the house all evening in over 6500 cubic feet of space and not encounter one bug, but about the time I am dozing off my ear becomes some mosquito or baby grasshopper’s prime target?
Whether half in dream state or just engaging my wild imagination, I give the bugs personalities.
They are stealthy, sneaking past bugzapper at the back door and waiting like a sniper until I was fully vulnerable and just about asleep. Maybe they are adventure junkies who have heard of the swat of death and dare to defy it. Some are spelunkers, ready to explore the cave of my inner ear at night.
I wonder if their bug friends are watching me slap my ear and neck silly, then watch me slap my pillow and shake out the sheets. Then I lie there, sleep warded off by the adrenaline of fighting an insect, wondering if there are more.
——— Speaking of bed time, that’s when I finally get time to paint my nails. It usually goes that I take off the old polish, then I am too sleepy to have time to paint and let them dry. So a few days to a week or so passes and maybe there’s an occasion to look fancy and I make time to paint them. I have resorted to only quick dry polish trying to lessen the possibility of discovering woven sheet imprints the next morning. Maybe one day that will be the style. I’ve seen worse fashion trends.
But why is it that the second I have done that last pinky nail my scalp itches? Or I sneeze and need to blow my nose? Or it feels like there is a bug in my ear?
I guess it’s kind of like how we have to scratch if anyone mentions head lice.
——— I know it’s fiction, but wonder about shows and movies that have some fancy ball with ladies dressed finely. Their dresses are sequined and probably “spot clean only” or, at the least, dry clean only as their accompanied tuxedos are. (The period dramas especially worry me with all those dresses dragging around the lawn. Maybe that’s it. It’s a lawn. Whereas I have a yard next to a pasture.) With all that in mind, I shake my head when there is a grand display of fireworks, and after oohing and ahhing, they go inside and keep dancing and flirting. Every fireworks display I have ever been to has left me and my clothes and hair smelling like gunpowder. I can’t wait to throw my clothes in the washer and get in the shower.
Of course, on a lot of those shows they are so drunk that they don’t smell it.
——— Speaking of drunk… I watch a lot of British television and laugh at how much they drink. Maybe it’s just not a thing in my circle of friends, but on these shows it can be any time of day at anybody’s house and out comes the whisky decanter as a sign of hospitality. Whether happy, sad, mad or glad, a “pint” is protocol. The scenes seldom have pub mix or any food to slow the alcohol absorption. Only once in a while is a character a teetotaler.
But I’m still worried about where the snacks are!
——— Speaking of things British, I treated my Brit Lit class to a Viking meal during the reading of Beowulf. Nuts, berries, milk, flatbread, and cheese were common fare for a Norse meal. It was all fun and games until I served the main dish — canned herring. Oh, most gagged at even the thought, but others tasted and one or two actually at a decent amount. They were appalled that I had a generous helping of the flatbread and herring for my lunch.
But, then, they certainly didn’t have fond memories of sardines and crackers while fishing with Daddy in a flatbed boat.
