Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Little Slugger
In my life, I have seen very few slugs. Maybe one when I was a child, closer to the ground and more prone to look at the life there. Maybe one when my parents were making me weed the front yard. Maybe an errant one on a sidewalk. My slug exposure has, for the most part, been minimal.
And then this happened.
In the past few weeks, nary a day has gone by where there hasn’t been a slug splooshing along near our back door. They never get very far, but there they are, like a lengthy booger, smudging their way into my home. Due to their lack of speed, I haven’t been horribly bothered by them. Speed is my primary problem with most bugs. Roaches move like there’s a fire behind them and spiders move both quickly and in a manner creepier than anything else. In the world. But these harmless booger bugs would just find their way in and then were content to scoot back and forth between the garbage can and the air vent, biding their time until matt picked them up and put them in the bush outside our door.
Except yesterday our slug came in (because I’ve convinced myself it’s just one slug who’s made an attachment to us and our humble abode) and I was making dinner. And matt was minding the baby. And this slug started to really move. Well, in a relative fashion. I was minding the sage butter (oh yes, be impressed) and I would periodically check his progress and he was edging ever nearer to me. I was alerting matt to the situation, but he felt he needed to stay with the baby. What? You can’t leave a baby on a couch unattended? Oh please.
All right, he probably had a point.
I was becoming more and more discontented. It was coming nearer and nearer. So I decided to take matters into my own hands. I grabbed one of the 4000 pieces of unopened mail that festoon our key table, and I decided to scoop the little fellow up and put him back where he belonged. I leaned in with the envelope and gently nudged it under the slug.
Then it happened. I saw this little boogie’s antennae and…I fell in love. Its buggy antennae were twirling and searching and withdrawing then coming back and I was smitten. What a cute little disgusting creature.
There was some amount to coaxing involved, but eventually, I got the bug onto its transportation and I took it outside. It was a bit of a production to release it from the envelope onto a welcoming leaf, but eventually I extricated it and walked happily back inside with my slightly moistened envelope.
I meant to go back to my cooking but instead I gasped. There was another slug on my floor.
Cuteness be damned, we clearly have an infestation. I was stunned by the rapidity with which one slug replaced another. And I was kind of afraid.
Lovefest over.
Matt came home from lunch today and when I walked into the kitchen it was with horror that I saw two slugs: one by the door and one sludging up it.
I think we have a problem.
In my life, I have seen very few slugs. Maybe one when I was a child, closer to the ground and more prone to look at the life there. Maybe one when my parents were making me weed the front yard. Maybe an errant one on a sidewalk. My slug exposure has, for the most part, been minimal.
And then this happened.
In the past few weeks, nary a day has gone by where there hasn’t been a slug splooshing along near our back door. They never get very far, but there they are, like a lengthy booger, smudging their way into my home. Due to their lack of speed, I haven’t been horribly bothered by them. Speed is my primary problem with most bugs. Roaches move like there’s a fire behind them and spiders move both quickly and in a manner creepier than anything else. In the world. But these harmless booger bugs would just find their way in and then were content to scoot back and forth between the garbage can and the air vent, biding their time until matt picked them up and put them in the bush outside our door.
Except yesterday our slug came in (because I’ve convinced myself it’s just one slug who’s made an attachment to us and our humble abode) and I was making dinner. And matt was minding the baby. And this slug started to really move. Well, in a relative fashion. I was minding the sage butter (oh yes, be impressed) and I would periodically check his progress and he was edging ever nearer to me. I was alerting matt to the situation, but he felt he needed to stay with the baby. What? You can’t leave a baby on a couch unattended? Oh please.
All right, he probably had a point.
I was becoming more and more discontented. It was coming nearer and nearer. So I decided to take matters into my own hands. I grabbed one of the 4000 pieces of unopened mail that festoon our key table, and I decided to scoop the little fellow up and put him back where he belonged. I leaned in with the envelope and gently nudged it under the slug.
Then it happened. I saw this little boogie’s antennae and…I fell in love. Its buggy antennae were twirling and searching and withdrawing then coming back and I was smitten. What a cute little disgusting creature.
There was some amount to coaxing involved, but eventually, I got the bug onto its transportation and I took it outside. It was a bit of a production to release it from the envelope onto a welcoming leaf, but eventually I extricated it and walked happily back inside with my slightly moistened envelope.
I meant to go back to my cooking but instead I gasped. There was another slug on my floor.
Cuteness be damned, we clearly have an infestation. I was stunned by the rapidity with which one slug replaced another. And I was kind of afraid.
Lovefest over.
Matt came home from lunch today and when I walked into the kitchen it was with horror that I saw two slugs: one by the door and one sludging up it.
I think we have a problem.
