Flea Infestation
Here’s the problem. Life doesn’t come with an instruction manual. OK, OK, we have our holy books, and they give us character guidelines. I am talking about specifics here, when life hands you those lemons, how do you make lemonade? Specifically!
When we move to Florida, we thought we were in Paradise. We had a house with a big pool, surrounded by shady trees, families of racoons, beautiful gardens – what’s not to like?
Paradise came with chamaeleons, lizards, cockroaches, even in the best houses. And fleas. We had to learn how to deal with them.
During our first and only flea infestation, at first we blamed the cats. Being a terrible mother, I asked my son to help, and he went into the walk in shower (No! Not naked! He was wearing swimming trunks!) to bathe the cats with anti-flea shampoo. I would get the cat trapped, put the cat in the shower, he would shampoo them, let one out and I would hand him the next one. Both cats loved him the best; he had chosen them from the litter.
When I saw this photo on LOLCATS, I really had to laugh.
see more crazy cat pics
Just so you will know, the solution is to take the cats to the vet and have them treated for fleas professionally. While the cats are at the vets, pour 20 Mule Team Borax over all your carpets and in all your upholstered furniture, let it stand overnight, and vacuum it all up. After you vacuum, bring the cats back. It really works. The borax creates a saline environment in which the fleas (and cockroaches) can’t survive, but it doesn’t hurt pets.
Every Sunset is a Beautiful Sunset
We were walking along Clearwater Beach, in Florida with a couple who had been our friends for years. We have so many stories with this couple, stories that make us all double over in laughter.
There was the time we were dining at a castle in Germany, a very lovely place, and when we ordered dessert, it came . . . chocolate mousse, but carefully placed, a la nouvelle cuisine, and striped with a chocolate syrup. As it was being put before us, we didn’t dare to look at one another. Only when the waiter left did the giggles start, growing into full grown guffaws, as we laughed helplessly.
The mousse looked like dog poop.
My husband was laughing so hard he had trouble breathing for a while. The gales of laughter, the whoops of laughter continued as we remembered the utter shock as the dessert was placed before us. To this day, we still don’t know if this was seriously supposed to be haute cuisine or if it was some kind of German joke. It still makes us roll with laughter thinking of the horrified surprise we each felt, and our fear of laughing in the waiter’s face.
There are other stories, stories funnier to us than they would be to you in the retelling.
Bill had a heart attack earlier in the year. AdventureMan and I were going through career transition issues. It was a time of struggle for both couples, and we were talking about what we were going through as the sun began to set. We all stopped and watched.
“What a beautiful sunset!” AdventureMan said.
There was a pause, as we all watched the last fading rays of the setting sun.
Bill took AdventureMan’s arm and looked at him intensely.
“Every sunset is a beautiful sunset,” he said, and added “when you think you may never see another.”
It changed how we see the sunset. It changed how we see the sunrise. Bill died this last year, having had many more sunsets after our sunset in Florida, and we still miss him grievously.
Beautiful Weird Thanksgiving
This was a beautiful, wierd Thanksgiving for me. It’s one of the very rare Thanksgivings that Adventure Man and I have not been together. He was down in Florida, at an all day eating, playing and visiting fest with our son, our son’s wife and her family. He shucked his first oysters, and was told he had better keep his day job.
I am in Seattle with my Mom, and we went to my best-friend-from-college’s house. It turned out to be one of the sweetest Thanksgivings I have had. As we sat down at the table, my friend said that in her house it is tradition to go around the table and to tell one thing you give thanks for. I found that incredibly moving. You have a glimpse into another person’s heart when you tell what you are thankful for.
And the food! Oh my! All my good resolutions, all my good intentions, down the drain – the food was SO good.
I took some photos to share with you:
The Veggies and the Salmon-Spinach Dip (oh WOW)
Making the world’s most tasty gravy, with fresh sage and thyme:
Carving one of the world’s most perfectly cooked turkeys:
The dining table – just before the carnage:
Thankgiving Invitation
Adventure Man and I will be attending different Thanksgiving Events this year, the first time ever. Here is the invitation to the event he will attend:
Thanksgiving!
•HEAR YE! HEAR YE!
•A THANKSGIVING CELEBRATION IS AT HAND
•A TIME TO GET TOGETHER TO GIVE THANKSGIVING, TO VISIT, TO CELEBRATE AND OF COURSE, TO EAT
•COME ONE AND ALL, COME EARLY TO THE THANKSGIVING CELEBRATION (usually the gathering starts around 9:00am)
•EVERYONE IS WELCOME AND BRING ANYONE YOU CAN GET TO COME ALONG
•COME EARLY, STAY LATE
•WE’LL HAVE THANKSGIVING LUNCH BETWEEN
1:00-1:30 PM
•THERE WILL BE ENOUGH FOOD PREPARED EARLY, IN CASE THE CHILDREN NEED TO EAT
•HOWEVER, THERE WILL BE PLENTY TO SNACK ON BEFORE THE MEALTIME
•KIDS BRING YOUR BATS, SOFTBALLS, KICKBALLS, FOOTBALLS, ROLLER SKATES, BIKES, SCOOTERS, ROPES OR WHATEVER
•Stay and Enjoy the leftovers for supper!!
WHEN: THANKSGIVING DAY, NOVEMBER 22, 2007
(Oh what fun!)
Bedbug Renaissance Inn
We had just come back to Germany from our son’s graduation from law school, and woke up the next morning with welts – we didn’t know what they were. All we knew is suddenly, we had red itchy welts, and I was allergic to whatever they were.
We were lucky – we got in to see a doctor right away, and he told us what they were and what to do, and we did it and we never had another problem. He also told us that he was seeing this problem more and more – that many hotels have extra guests they never tell you about, even the very best hotels. (Our poor kitty – we had blamed her, we thought maybe she had brought in fleas, and it wasn’t her at all, it was hitch-hikers from Florida.)
What we learned from this truly awful experience is that bedbug infestations are happening everywhere. It’s something no one talks about out of shame, but with DDT off the market, and increasingly warm climates, they are on the increase.
To this day, I wash my sheets in hot hot water, and dry them on hot. And I think twice when I say to children, as is common in the USA “sleep tight, and don’t let the bed bugs bite!”
From AOL News:
(Nov. 7) – First come the bites, amazingly itchy, raised red welts that appear, literally, overnight. Then, you might notice scarlet spots on your sheets from smashed bugs or perhaps clusters of little black dots that you assume are dirt but are in fact constellations of fecal matter.
And one day, you might wake up in the wee hours of the morning, flip on the lights and find red bugs, slightly bigger than ticks, crawling on your sheets, pillows and legs.
Welcome to the most retro pest of the 21st century, the bedbug. The bugs, which were thought to be wiped out by powerful pesticides such as DDT 30 years ago, are back and infesting major urban areas, suburbia and the heartland.
You can read the entire horrifying story at AOL Health News.
USA Today’s List of How to Cope with a Bedbug Infestation:
Coping With Bedbugs: Advice From Experts
The best rule of thumb for dealing with bedbugs? Try not to get them in the first place.
Otherwise, read on:
Be careful where you put your suitcase when you travel. “These guys are fantastic hitchhikers,” says the University of Maryland’s Michael Raupp. “If you have a luggage rack with metal racks, put your suitcase on that.”
Check behind a hotel headboard. That’s one of their favorite spots, Raupp says. Pull back the comforter and sheets and look for the fecal stains on the mattress seams and ticking. Shine a penlight behind the headboard and look for dark fecal stains.
If you do wake up with red welts, assume the worst. “At that point, when you go home, all laundry goes into a trash bag outside, and then right into a washing machine on a hot cycle, and then a clothes dryer,” says the University of Kentucky’s Michael F. Potter. “As little as five or 10 minutes kills everything on high heat. Cold will not kill the eggs and not all the adults.”
Don’t pull mattresses and dressers off the street. Steer clear of yard sales or flea markets. And don’t ever buy used bedding.
If you do get them, don’t use a bomb or spray, which will only scatter them through your home. “Find a good pest-control company. This is not one where you buy bug spray and battle it yourself,” Potter says.
In many cases, pros suggest getting rid of your box spring and mattress, or if you can’t, using a bug-proof zippered mattress cover that traps the buggers inside for at least a year.
Source: USA Today
She Did Everything Right
When I was a little girl growing up in Alaska, we had neighbors who lived just across the creek. Our neighbors had a daughter 6 years older than me; she was my first babysitter. Growing up, those six years made all the difference – we didn’t know one another as friends, the gap was too great. Our families were very close, however, and when my parents would go to parties at her parents house, they would take us and put us to bed in her bed.
I saw her now and then through the years, but our lives were in different places. When I was just getting married, she had big boys, by the time my son was a teenager, hers were getting married and going to college. We reconnected in Florida, of all places, where we both ended up at the same time due to our husband’s jobs.
Having our Alaska childhood in common, having grown up together and knowing each other’s family through all the years created a strong bond. We saw each other often; she was like a big sister to me.
She always had it all together. She had a group that bicycled together every morning, and then had outings later in the day. She was a fitness buff, and ran in the mornings before she bicycled. She kept herself thin, and she loved to cook, but she could eat what she wanted because she exercised it all off.
She was a reader, and would pass along the really good books to me. She and her husband were also news buffs, so when we would get together with our husbands, there was never a dull moment at the dinner table.
She and her husband were sent to Egypt, and to Rumallah, and to China, and they made the most of every minute. They loved traveling, they loved their sailing boat, they loved their family. They would come to visit us in our places of the world, and we would have great reunions. They were so alive.
She could be annoying. She would chide me about not exercising enough. She would comment on how much food people ate. She always knew the latest in medical research to back herself up. She kept her mind active, and she kept her weight down. She exercised, she travelled, she took care of her parents, she did good works for others. She did everything right.
A couple years ago, we joined her and her husband for dinner. She hadn’t combed her hair. She weighed about 20 lbs more, and didn’t seem to notice. She couldn’t remember the last book she had read, and she couldn’t remember her recent trip to Mexico, or an earlier one to Spain.
It’s been downhill since then. Her loving husband is strong and able to care for her, this once-beautiful, sprite-like, spirited woman. I think she still knew me, when I saw her last summer, but she can no longer really express what she is thinking. She is restless, up and down from the table, and not able to participate in the conversation.
I am haunted. I am so much like her; I tried to live up to all that she has taught me. A part of me wants to scream at God “This isn’t fair! She did everything right!”
Perhaps doing everything right gave her a few extra years, and I am just not seeing things from the right perspective. Meanwhile, I get no answers, and my heart breaks when I think of her.
Kitchen Before and After
Wooo Hoooooooo! The ugly kitchen is gone! The new kitchen is finished!
Before:
After:
The Arab Way
My husband and I were very young when we first came to live in the Middle East, back to back embassy assignments, first in Tunisia, and then in Jordan. Before those assignments, we had spent two years learning about the culture, and my husband spoke Arabic and I spoke French. It didn’t matter. We were still woefully ignorant. (And we are still learning!)
People would call us, asking for favors, especially visas and getting their kids into U.S. colleges. We would look at each other in astonishment. How could they think their kids could get into college without passing the tests? How did they think their cousin could get into pilot training when there were other, better qualified candidates? And we learned, that with the right connections, exceptions are made.
We got smarter. We were travelling back in Germany, and wanted to stay in military lodging, but all the rooms were taken. We decided to go get something to eat, and at dinner, I said to my husband “let’s try doing it the Arab way.” He looked at me and said “Whaaaaaattt?”
“Take your orders that say we are with the embassy and on special leave” I told him. “Tell them we just got in, and just need a place for tonight.”
“But they don’t have any rooms!” Adventure Man protested.
“They always hold rooms back for special circumstances, for pilots, for emergencies,” I countered. “Make us special.”
We finished dinner, and felt better with our blood sugars back up. Adventure Man became his charming persona, and we went back to the hotel. He was inside for a bare two minutes, and came back out grinning, and holding a key.
We have learned an important lesson. Yes, there are policies. Yes, there are rules. Yes, there are the way things are done, customs, traditions, inviolable.
But there are also exceptions, and they are based on personal relationships.
Our insurance company told us they would no longer insure our Florida house, too much risk exposure in Florida. We went to a lot of trouble to try to meet a guideline that would allow us to be an exception – to no avail. Yesterday, I spent an hour on the phone with one person who was persistently pleasant in telling me it was not possible. I told her that telling me what a great customer I was, and how they valued our loyalty didn’t ring true when they would abandon us after all our years of being good customers. I didn’t blame her, personally, but neither was I buying all this pleasant stuff, when the bottom line was money, not loyalty.
I hung up the phone with a huge pit in my stomach – this cloud, this worry has hung over my head all summer, and now my worst fears had come true and I would have to seek new, less reliable, insurance. But I decided to put it off until tomorrow, no point trying to do something when you feel really depressed.
Late last night, we were in those early hours of dead-drooling sleep, the phone rang, and it was the insurance representative calling us back. Four hours after our phone call, the phone call which had been “the final answer” she was calling me back to say she had found a way, and our policy was being re-instated.
Thanks be to God! The Arab way worked, even though I wasn’t consciously using the Arab way, probably my thinly veiled anger and frustration and bottom line TERROR had gotten through to her. I thought it was over, but God was working behind the scenes, and a miracle happened.
We are still learning; we still have a lot to learn, and living in this culture helps us continue learning a new tools, additional strategies, for our tool box.
Pensacola Kitchen Renovation
Woooooo Hoooooo! Our son just sent us photos from the continuing renovations on our Pensacola house.
Kitchen before:
Kitchen after (we are still waiting for the tile man to put in the new wall tiles)
You can hear nightmare stories about renovations gone awry – but you won’t hear them from me. We found a truly wonderful contractor, David Murphy of Tacoma Construction. He personally checks the quality of the work, gives accurate estimates, and he has good ideas to implement what you want done.
One day, as I was having the house interior painted, I could hear voices rising, and I felt a little concerned. I listened, and what they were discussing, with great heat, was just what exactly a certain verse from the bible meant. 🙂 We feel so blessed; they did their work well, and the work was completed in a reasonable time frame. And how did I find this gem? On the internet.
Where is Pensacola, FL?
It isn’t only my Kuwaiti friends . . . . many of my American friends don’t know where Pensacola is, either.
Pensacola is almost in Alabama.
You can see it at the far left of the map. It has a big bay, and a barrier island with a gorgeous, white sand beach. It is fairly unspoiled, as Florida goes, with more moderate temperatures, and some slight shift in seasons.
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