The One with the Mini War

If you’ve never encountered an Earwig consider yourself lucky. These insects are totally scary looking, albeit relatively harmless. Their pincers freak me out and I can’t stand finding them scurrying across my kitchen counters.

I have killed a handful of these lobster-esque insects in the past week and didn’t think much of it. Besides being annoyed of course. But then Monday morning came. I decided to go downstairs to tackle packing the odds and ends in basement storage. I was not looking forward to this job because I prefer to stay out of the unfinished portion of our basement. Spiders and bugs of all sorts enjoy the cool damp location. But I put on my big girl shoes and headed down.

As I was gathering up boxes and trying to find organization amongst the chaos I had created for myself, I noticed a few earwigs running hither and thither. For some reason I decided to look up at the small basement window that was covered with a rectangular of styrofoam (for whatever reason, I don’t know.)

And that’s when I saw them–hundreds of earwigs perched side by side army style across the top half of the styrofoam. OH. MY. GOSH.

To my surprise and yours, I didn’t scream. I calmly went about my business because none of the bugs were moving. I gave a little blow in their direction and the breeze made them stir–assuring me the army was alive and well.

I headed upstairs to inform my husband.

“Kevin, we have a situation. There are tons and tons of earwigs on the basement window. I think we need to vacuum them up.”

He didn’t seem convinced, but he grabbed the vacuum cleaner–now looking officially like a Ghost Buster–and we went downstairs. Kevin was stunned at the mass of insects I had discovered.

We (mostly HE) spent the next 20 minutes with the vacuum running, sucking up earwig after earwig. The second window was infested as well.

Kevin left the vacuum running when we were done for fear of the bugs crawling out and seeking their revenge. The only solution was to BURN THEM.

He put the vacuum bag in a cardboard box, doused it in lighter fluid, took it outside to a cement pad and set those bugs ablaze!

MY HERO.