A Merry, Ant-y Christmas! UGH!

Do y’all remember the Great Ant Invasion Saga, at this time last year? (here, here, here, and here)

Well, we had been pretty much free of them for several months, but the last month or so they have returned...especially since it’s been raining much of the last week and a half.

We had started seeing scouts again in mid-November, which is always a sign of gathering forces lurking and waiting to land on our beaches. We had plenty of our secret weapons of mass destruction handy – particularly that lovely air-borne biological weapon known as RAID. Their D-Day was Thanksgiving Day, and they tried several landings throughout the day, culminating with a mass invasion through a breach on the North Bathroom front in the evening (what they wanted there, I have no idea!). They were quickly discouraged through the use of the secret biological weapon, but we knew we had not seen the last of the enemy forces.

The rain last week made perfect conditions for another invasion. As the water poured down steadily nearly all day on Wednesday, we could sense the growing tension among their troops. Scouts were seen and killed in both the North and South Bathrooms (which are only a wall apart, but open off of completely different sections of the house). And then, Thursday morning, H-Hour came and they invaded, unnoticed until a few hours later. We were just about to leave to run an out-of-town errand when the attack was discovered. The front battalion occupied the outside door frame of the North Bathroom, and troops extended as far as the eye could see along the ceiling of the Hallway Sector, disappearing into the Linen Closet area. RAID and a chair (thankfully the Hallway Sector has a low ceiling!) were quickly brought to the invasion site and the troops wiped out within moments.

However, they were but the smoke revealing the fire – the majority of their numbers had already hunkered down under the carpet. You remember the whole Leak Saga, and how the carpet had to be pulled up and the padding removed from the water spill? It was under this still-loose carpet that they had established headquarters and centered their forces. The extermination of this extension of their invasion required several minutes and a lot of the secret biological weapon, but it was accomplished and they were routed from the scene. (As a side note, there are still dead troops littering the floor of the North Bathroom in an effort to discourage another such attempt.)

That was last week’s skirmish, but this week they tried a new tactic – one of the worst atrocities yet in this ongoing War. They invaded...(drumroll please).….…………… THE CHRISTMAS TREE!!!

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is true. Our unscrupled opponent has dared to commit this barbaric and horrific crime against the people.

Our Christmas Tree is decorated with lights and a variety of ornaments, ranging from beautiful to the ornate to the unique to the unusual to the homemade...you get the idea. Included among its festive decorations are several candy canes, which usually are not a problem. However, just last Friday my dad had brought home another candy cane from work...one which is less tightly wrapped... You guessed it. Their reconnaissance forces must have discovered this delicacy and led the main attack. They had swarmed down the wall and up the trunk of the tree, out one of the branches, and into the candy cane.

Which is all to explain why, 3 days before Christmas, my mother is at Home Depot purchasing more of the weapons of mass destruction!

Have a very merry ant-free Christmas!!

:)

PS – don’t forget to visit my blog on Wednesday (Christmas Eve) to see my special Christmas post!! :)