Sunday, September 4, 2011

Not Exactly What I Like About The South

It rains and then it stops and it's gray and that doesn't stop and I worked in the garden, pulling great weeds and small ones too and I kept saying, "I'll stop when it really rains," but then it didn't and it didn't and finally I stopped anyway and now it's raining.

We have a fly infestation. We had one last year, I remember. I don't have the slightest idea where they are coming from. There are so many that it seems as if I should be able to see a black cyclone of them entering the house from whatever hell hath spawned them. It's as if some King Of The Flies has placed a side of beef or pork in the house, sequestered it away and ordered all of his queens to lay their eggs in it and now they have all come to life. We smack, smack, smack them and Mr. Moon has put up three rolls of sticky fly paper and still, there are more and more and more. I actually broke a fly-swatter last week and Mr. Moon bought a new one today. I said, "You should have bought two. We could have killed in congress."
Mr. Moon often wonders what in hell I'm talking about.
So do I.

This is my Labor Day weekend. Weeding and fly-killing. Well, I SAID I wanted to take care of my own life and flies and weeds are part of that.

God, I feel lazy. I suppose it's the rain. The pressure and the rain. At least it's not hot. I think I feel like some ridiculous Southern Stereotype. Old Cracker Woman pulls weeds in overalls, comes in and kills flies as a tropical depression approaches, is grateful that it's not hot.

Yes. That is me.

If I drank Bourbon, I would go fill a jelly glass full of it and sit on the porch and drink it and watch the rain come down.

I do not drink Bourbon. But if I did, that is exactly what I'd do. In my tattered silk slip, yellowed from age, and I would keep my flyswatter at hand, sipping and rocking, sipping and rocking and the rain would fall and fall.


13 comments:

  1. My bro in law used to have a similar prob, but with lady bugs! I hated to see them be killed, but honestly there were so many all over the place, it was kind of gross.

    Fill that jelly jar with vodka.
    Yummy!
    xo

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  2. One of the worst thing about hot weather is the flies, but you give a whole new image to it, the sight of you in your yellow tattered silk slip swatting them away nursing your imaginary glass of bourbon. Thanks, Ms moon for the visuals.

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  3. The tattered slip, the jelly glass, the bourbon, what a sultry and sensous image that is to my cold Canadian sensibilities.

    I recall from when I lived in tropical climes that flies follow rain the same as mosquitos do, just a couple days later.

    Reading you and loving it.\

    -invisigal

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  4. Nice image! I think I would buy a small flame thrower instead of the flyswat.

    Fruit flies or bluebottles? If fruitflies, then bowls of vinegar with a one drop of washing up liquid in them, Danielle's tip, works a treat. If big flies, damn, I think i'd be tempted to leave for a month. Go fling yourself on the mercy of your children!

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  5. God, I just love that image of the tattered silk slip, drinking bourbon on the porch, rocking and watching the rain. I could do it so easily.

    I too live in bug country. First it was the spiders, then the crickets, next the grasshoppers and now, the scorpions. I suppose the flies will arrive next.

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  6. You're the only person I know who would feel lazy after a day of weed pulling. I'd feel downright *holy* after that amount of work.
    I love the image of you on the porch with rain falling, sipping and rocking. We do that sometimes (though more likely with iced tea) and it's a feeling like the world got smaller.

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  7. My mama called it a flyflap. I thought that a silly name for such an important object. And then the spankings she gave me with it! Lordy. Now I'm a southern stereotype too.

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  8. O my GOd I hated those hanging yellow things with dead flies on it with a passion. My aunt had them all over the house. They grossed me out big time. Being a city girl dead flies did something to me. Still hate those hanging sticky things with a passion.
    My mom had a cat with nine tails to smack us... A wooden handle with 9 leather strips attached. We also had to go and get it ourselves... What memories you writing about flies can bring on... :o)))

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  9. We have fly swatters in every room and three on the stoep or verandah. When does your autumn get here?

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  10. I think you are really strong to go out and weed. I have that to do tomorrow.

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  11. Ha! I've been away from Blogland and I'm getting caught up. I just posted about bourbon a little bit ago!

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  12. I had a dream about being in Korea the other night, and there being swarms of flies overhead, filling the sky.

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  13. I like the bourbon, but the bourbon doesn't like me.

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