Flee flea!

Last spring, a very friendly and cute calico cat showed up at our door. I tried to ignore her for a few days, but finally gave in and fed her. Not the best idea I’ve had. Eventually this lovely stray cat had six lovely kittens, each cuter than the next. This combined with my own two cats (yes, they were also strays who showed up at the doorstep over the years) and my daughter’s cat meant we had 10 cats running around our house this summer.

We’re down to six now – two kittens tried to escape by hiding in Brent’s truck. We found and returned one after a delightful chase scene at the local gas station, but the other we’ve not seen since. One kitten was adopted and another was lost to a failed attempt at crossing the road. My daughter’s cat – a lifelong indoor cat – decided one day she wanted to be an outdoor cat. She hung around the front door for a week, but we haven’t seen her for a month now.

The downside to all this is that flea treatment is freakin’ expensive! And fleas like to hitch rides on our clothing, making the transition from outdoor pests to little bitty indoor torture machines. So now we have to undertake the painstaking and time consuming task of ridding the house of fleas. (Anyone want to adopt a kitten or two? Please?!)

Here’s how it’s done, according to my brother, Bill, the pest control professional:

Supplies needed:
§ Vacuum bags – lots of them. 10 or 12 is not too many.
§ Moth balls
§ Flea Spray with IGR (Insect Growth Regulator), or one that says it “kills all stages of fleas – eggs, larva, pupa, adult.” NOT flea bombs.
§ Insect granules that lists “fleas”

1) Arrange to have cat flea dipped as it will need to be out of the house for several hours anyhow.

2) Get EVERYTHING off the floor, this includes bottom of closets, under beds, storage rooms, etc. YOU MUST TREAT 113% OF THE FLOORS!!

3) Buy extra vacuum bags and moth balls, you’re going to need them.

4) Vacuum all floors, be they carpeted or hard wood. Put 2 moth balls in the vacuum bag first! When you’re done, take the bag outside to the trash or burn it.

5) Buy flea spray (no "flea bombs") that says it has an IGR in it (Insect Growth Regulator), or it may say "kills all stages of fleas, egg, larva, pupa, adult.” You can buy it at Lowes, Home Depot, Walmart, etc. Read label VERY carefully as it will tell you how many square feet it will cover. DON'T MISS ANY OF THE FLOOR!!!!!!

6) Wait about 5-6 hours and vacuum again - with moth balls in the vacuum bag - and dispose of the 2nd bag. Vacuum every day for a week in the same manner.

7) In about 2 weeks you will see some fleas again, this is normal. You can not kill all stages no matter what the label says. The chemical you have put down will still be there and it will kill them. When you start to see them like that, whip out the vacuum and mothballs again and vacuum 2-3 times each room and trash the bag. You should be done at this point.

8) Buy a bag of insect granules, (kind doesn’t matter as long as fleas are listed on the label) and spread them over the entire yard. Do this the day you spray. The granules are clay or ground corn cob with pesticide on them and need rain/watering to activate.

9)You may want to invest in some Top Spot or some other type of flea stuff for the cat; flea collars only cover about 12 inches, so your cat’s ass will still have fleas.


So, if you ever find yourself covered in fleas, now you know how to get rid of them. And if you ever find yourself looking into the eyes of a very friendly and very cute stray cat begging you piteously for food, go ahead and feed it – right AFTER you treat it for fleas!

Mother's Day

My husband sometimes surprises me, like today at church. Every Mother's Day, mothers of the congregation are given a carnation by each of their children. When the time came, my daughter went up to the front with all the other adult children to get a flower for me. At the same time, my husband went up (his own mother passed away many years ago.)

I asked him, "Where are you going?"

"I'm going to get a flower for you," he said.

"Why? I'm not your mother."

"It will be from Brian," he said. He turned and walked up to the front and I just melted into tears. My son, Brian, is away from home, training with the Marine Corps and I had been missing him. My husband sweetly and thoughtfully stood in for him today.

Makes me glad I stuck with him these 21 years.

30 years!

So I got an invite to my high school class's 30 year reunion. My first thought was, "No! It can't be 30 years already!" But, yeah, it's been 30 years. I'm sure everyone else will be looking gray and fat and old. Not me. LOL. Yeah, right.

Not sure what I think about all this. On one hand I'm excited to catch up with people I haven't seen in three decades. On the other hand, I'm not exactly where I would have wanted to be had someone asked in 1978, "Where do you see yourself in 30 years?" I find myself reviewing my life, trying to find a way to spin the dull details into something at least mildly interesting. Let's see - graduated, got married, had a kid, got divorced, got married to a decent guy this time, had another kid, survived 18 years of an alcoholic spouse, he got sober and we bought a house, celebrated the birth of our first grandson, spouse lost job and can't find a decent replacement, might lose the house, cat had kittens, apple trees are blooming, veggies being planted next weekend..... life is good as long as you're still living it.

My brother recently celebrated one year cancer-free. Yay, Bill! Keep kickin' cancer's ass! It was a rough ride for him, and he still has his down moments. He had to sell his cherished four-wheelers to free up money for bills and was feeling justifiably pissy about it. He still has his dream of running a hotel in the UP (he can't wait to get the hell out of Tennessee) but he's stuck where he is for at least another four years - insurance issues. I don't blame him for getting down, but I reminded him that he can still come home and kiss his woman, play with his dog, snuggle his cat, feed the deer that ghost out of woods behind his house, etc etc etc..... Were it not for modern medicine, he'd be dead right now. (Yes, he asked the doctors.) I'm proud of him. It's brought us closer, even though we live 8 hours away from each other.

I'm trying to learn to become more assertive. There are things that need to be said, but in a straightforward, kind way. It would NEVER do to tell the lady at church, "You know what? You complain too much!" or to tell someone at work, "If you'd stop chit-chatting all damn day, you might actually get something done and not be so stressed out!" That's my internally-focused-self-improvement project at the moment.

Guess that's all for now.