Just when I thought I had life under control, (pause here for thirty minutes of hysterical laughter for even thinking I can be in control ), the Big Guy Upstairs quietly dumps something on me to remind me that I am NOT in control of ANYTHING ! It doesn't have to be anything major like cancer or brain bleeds or falling out of a plane without a parachute. No, the gentle reminders can be so small you might very well not notice them at all, until there are a million of them crawling on your clothes.
I am speaking here about the most vile creatures that God ever created. T I C K S . . . UGH !!!!!!
I HATE ticks !!!! The little blood sucking bastards freak me out. Always have, always will. I am going to take a leap here in saying there isn't a person on this planet who likes ticks. They have lots of nasty little legs that allow them to crawl up your body at an incredible speed. They can be minuscule or massive, either way they are NASTY !
And so today when The Man's grand daughter cam running up to the house with her cousin screaming that they were COVERED in ticks my first instinct was to say, "Call your father". But being the "good" person that I am I calmly met the girls outside the back door to assess the situation. It was NOT GOOD! These girls were not kidding when they said they were "COVERED" in ticks. They had ticks on their shoes, socks, pants and shirts.
Welcome to the woods of the UP in the Spring.
Yesterday began quietly as is usual for our summers on the farm. Being Sunday I went to church, came home and had breakfast with The Man. I believe I wrote more about the rest of the morning and our picking up the girls. If I thought that was worth writing about I had no idea what was in store for me later in the day. When we FINALLY got the girls back to the farm and The Man went in to take his nap, (being the smart man that he is and realizing I was in a VERY piss poor mood) With The Man out of the mix things settled down. The girls got set up out in the parlor where they welcomed my presence. They got out the checker board that GD4 (grand daughter #4) had discovered last summer. I taught her how to play checkers so she was anxious to try playing against her cousin. Cousin did not know how to play but caught on very quickly and it was an entertaining time watching the 2 of them try to out play each other. After that they moved on to "resting" with their phones in hand. I left them alone and all was well with the world.
At some point after The Man woke up the girls showed their faces and asked if they could go outside. DUH! OF COURSE YOU CAN GO OUTSIDE ! Out they bounced only to return a short while later complaining that it was TOO HOT ! (76 degrees with a breeze. But the sun WAS hot.) So back inside they went to continue doing what ever pre teen girls do. There was a short attempt at beading, (The Man has a treasure trove of beads that his wife used to craft the most amazing things.) At first The Man resisted allowing GD4 to even look at the beads but he finally gave in and chose a small array of things for the girls to work with.) Naturally that interest lasted all of about 5 minutes. As all this was going on I was preparing dinner.
(Side note . . . are all kids this picky? Everything I mentioned was met with. . . "I don't like that" until I TOLD them I was cooking burgers. They didn't even like potato chips with their burgers. ??????)
Dinner finished, dishes are done, (not by the girls for sure) and The Man is ready to crash. (All this change of routine is very upsetting to him) Little did he know what was about to happen. It was at this point the girls asked if they could once again go outside. Again "OF COURSE" ! Five minutes later they are at the door asking if they can go into the woods by the drive way. Without thinking I told them to go have fun. I never gave a thought to the multitude of creepy crawly flying critters that occupy this space in the spring. The mosquitos are the size of Boeing 757's and travel in swarms that cover an entire field. Bug spray is a MUST up here. And so out went the girls, The Man and I sat down to watch some TV and all was well with the world . . . for about 5 minutes.
My phone rang . . . I answered it . . . There is an hysterical girl on the phone screaming something about doing a wash, ticks, woods, covered, help help help !!!!!! It seems that the girls went walking in the woods until one of them realized there were ticks all over her and her clothes. GD4 had on black sweat pants and a black tee shirt. She could not see the ticks but little cousin in the tan shorts and white tee shirts could. I told them I would meet them outside on the back patio. All this while The Man is listening to my side of the conversation and saying, "WHAT? WHAT? WHAT? THEY ARE NOT DOING A WASH!!!!I DIDN'T HAVE THEM COME HERE TO DO LAUNDRY!!!" As usual I ignored him and went on out to access the situation.
The girls were not kidding. Freaking ticks everywhere !!!! I had the girls strip as much as possible and we put their tick laden clothes in a basket OUTSIDE. They then went STRAIGHT to the shower leaving their clothes in another basket that I took outside and started to TICK PICK !! Delightful game that I would rather not EVER play again. When I thought I had all or most of the little bastards picked off I did a load of HOT HOT HOT water wash. Good bye ticks ! Grandpa took a few hours to calm down and he did nothing.
Today The man and the girls may have recovered but I am still scratching and looking for little black dots with legs.
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