Bugged by pests

My boring, bland dinner

Today, I learned some things.

I learned that the yellow jackets flying around the street-side window in Katie's room are coming from a nest under the roof.

I learned that the cabinet moths that have been flying around my kitchen have a more official name  – Indian Meal Moths – and that the worms that I found in my food  most likely came into my house from the South Hadley Big Y, causing me to think I should go tell them about the money I spent replacing the food that I threw away. Maybe they'll give me a coupon for something.

An exterminator from Terminix told me these things after he went up to get rid of the yellow jackets and extend a bee pole up to take care of the nest. I wasn't happy about calling an exterminator, so I was pleasantly surprised when he told me that Terminix has switched to  environmentally friendly products. He left me a pheromone catcher to trap the rest of the nasty moths; I have been vacuuming them up and squishing them for a couple of weeks. Sweet success: One of them wandered in there shortly after I put it on the counter.

Last night I closed Katie's door and used a towel to cover the gap at the bottom, but not before one of the yellow jackets got out, causing me to stand in my PJs in the upstairs hall, brandishing an old New Yorker. It went into hiding, so I gave up and took Maddie into my room and closed the door and put a towel at the bottom. This took until about midnight.

Another bug is in the picture, and that is the bug, probably graft vs. host and colitis, bothering my stomach for more than two weeks. Nothing I eat seems to sit well. You can see from the photo what I had for dinner: rice and homemade applesauce. This is getting me down.

You would not expect to find the words "happy coincidence" and "appointment with  gastroenterologist" in the same sentence, but those phrases paired when Melissa said them to me after I told her on the phone that I have an appointment at Western Massachusetts Gastroenterology tomorrow morning to discuss my upcoming routine colonoscopy.

It has only been three days since I started taking the new medications, cipro and flagyl, and she said she and Dr. Alyea are on board with giving them more time to work as they did last time in addition to the steroid budesinide, which I have been taking since the first time this happened in June.

I'll be interested to hear what the doctor the has to say.

The creature, unmasked

The other day I wrote about scary words coming from my basement.

Today it was scary sounds.

The Terminix man was here, making a racket. Pound pound pound. Chip, chip. Then, the sound of wood chips falling down. Maddie lay on her bed, her ears up. She looked anxiously at me, then to the basement door, then back to me.

The man's name was Gordon Barnes. Sounded to me like a character out of Hemingway. Terminix was supposed to send someone last week. I waited the three-hour window, but they stood me up. I didn't care. I didn't want to see them anyway, until every night I remembered the reason I had called.

The creature runs around in my walls and in my ceiling every night. It scratches, claws, scuttles. It is so loud that it wakes me up. I imagine a huge claw coming through the ceiling or a scary creature falling through. My friend Karen said it actually happened to a friend of hers: A raccoon fell through her ceiling. Thanks, Karen.

After the creature woke me up the other night, I decided to call Terminix again. We all need our sleep, especially those with health issues. Gordon Barnes called and said he'd be over.

First stop, the attic. He said he found mouse droppings and even one dead mouse. Although there is no attic over my bedroom, he said there is a vent through which mice could travel. So the creature is probably a mouse or mice. I asked him what he did with the dead one. "Left it up there. It's dead anyway," he said. "Ummmm, do you think you could get it for me?" I asked. He guessed he could, and he went up and brought it down in a bag.

Maddie went over to examine the Terminix guy's measuring

wheel. For back-up, she brought her teddy bear.

Next stop, the basement. The basement is unfinished, with big old tree trunks and ancient beams the major supports. Anyone who goes down there sees trouble. There is evidence of old powder post beetle and termite damage. Sure enough, Gordon came up triumphantly waving a piece of rotten wood showing the lines made by termites and the holes bored by powder post beetles.

"If you've never been treated, you really should be," he said, explaining that although he didn't see any evidence of present activity, you never know when there could be some. "I'm sure it's been treated at some time," I said. Yes, but...he went back to "If you've never been treated" and I said the same thing I said before. He still had that piece of rotten wood in his hand. I was getting itchy.

When he went outside to measure the house, I fished through some papers, and, miraculously, found the piece of paper saying Terminix had treated for powder post beetles in 2006. Ah ha! When I told him, he was surprised that they hadn't followed through with their promised yearly inspections. These are things I just don't remember to think about. So he said never mind about treating again and he will check in with the office about why they haven't followed through.

Anyway, he wants to charge $450 for a service contract that basically amounts to setting mousetraps now and spraying for bugs in the spring and summer. They do not come and reset the traps, although they will pick them up and throw them away. Sounds like a lot of money for not much.

Anyone want to come over and have a mouse-trap-setting party? I will supply coffee and dessert. It will be so much fun! Come on over, and I'll let you paint my picket fence if you give me an apple.

He also thinks I should treat for the non-existent termites ($1,281) and get the attic insulated with insulation made of boric acid, which repels pests and mice ($700, price negotiable.) He said I'm probably losing 30 percent of my heat through that attic. I'm thinking about doing the insulation, but I'm not excited about the termite treatment.

They use an insecticide called Termidor to get the termites. I asked Gordon for more information and he gave me a raft of papers. I am going to take it to Dana-Farber with me on Monday. Sounds pretty yukky to me...and like money I don't want to spend for something that's not there.

In the meantime, at least I know that my creature is only a mouse. Still, if it falls out of the ceiling before the mouse traps get set, I bet that Susie will hear me scream all the way in Australia.