Ants

We have ants. By "we" I mean residents of Portland.
Well, at least I know I'm not alone in this world, this world full of tiny, six-legged creatures who seem to like sugar even more than I do. If you have ever had ants, you know that the first two things you want to know once you discover them are 1) Where did they come from? and 2) How can I get rid of them?

Question 1: Where did they come from?
When we first noticed the ants, we saw only the soldiers out on reconnaissance missions. An ant here. An ant there. Mostly in the kitchen, some lost souls way over in the bathroom. We knew at that point that we had to figure out a way to put a stop to the ants without poisoning the cats... But where were they coming from? The problem with ants is that until you have a large group on a full-fledged sugar quest all you can see are a few bugs wandering around. A paradox: Do you keep things clean so as not to induce a total invasion or do you set out a bowl full of sugar in order to find out where things stand. Like any fallible humans, we didn't really have to decide; our habits decided for us. A few mornings ago, I woke up to find ANTS. I traced them from the goal, our recycling, to the source, our front door. What!? The ants are waltzing in right through the front door!?!? How audacious! I wiped up the ants with a sponge, took out the recycling, and moved on to the second question.

Question 2: How can I get rid of them?
Okay, when you have a problem that needs solving a decent approach is to break it down into parts and see if perhaps you can deal with just one part and solve the whole thing. So, I thought. Ants like to eat. We like to eat. Ants like to eat what we like to eat. So, we can't just get rid of the food altogether. The ants come in through the front door. We come in through the front door. Dang it! We sure do have a lot in common with the ants.
When I was a kid, I read a gardening book that told me to use soap to get rid of bugs in my garden, so I decided to spray cleaning solution across the threshold of the door whenever I thought of it. The next day, I found that I had incorrectly answered question one; the ants were actually coming in UNDER the front door. Ugh. Today Celeste and I were just moments away from pouring glue into the entry-hole when we thought better of it... Won't they just come in via some other crevice if we do this?

So that's where it stands now. We decided not to use the glue because we knew the ants would get around it somehow. We are being outsmarted by a bunch of bugs whose entire bodies are only a teensy fraction of the size of our brains.
Am I crazy to be thinking about luring them away from the house by putting caches of sugar on the outskirts of the property?

groove thing

Okay, I think I am only starting to get a little bit into the groove of working at the Humane Society. It is troubling... working this late schedule seems to eat up all my time somehow. I feel like I spend all my waking hours getting ready for work, at work or getting ready for bed. Ugh. I know that in large part that is the way of the 40 hour work week. I am trying to remember how long it took me to get over this feeling when I was working at Eldora. It seems like it took about 2 months or so, but this should take less time since I am not spending 2 hours commuting every day like I was in CO. Right?

The problem with my job at the Humane Society is that it is boring. When it is busy there, it's not so bad- just repetitive. However, those busy days are usually restricted to weekends, so that's a majority of boring days each week.
Today was one of the boring days. This morning we were required to go in 2 hours early to listen to an insurance salesman guilt us into selling pet insurance to new adopters. I felt like I was the only one who was suspicious of his "We're just looking out for the animals," and, "Our goal is to break even on Oregon Humane Society adoptions." Look man, if you weren't breaking even you wouldn't be making glamorous offers of ski trips for all the customer service employees. You wouldn't be buying EVERYONE breakfast. You wouldn't be selling insurance. Don't guilt us; we generate a HUGE database of marketing leads for you. When you start paying me commission, I will start thinking about selling your insurance. My favorite part was when he suggested that we buy the insurance for our own pets so that we could more fully answer new adopters' questions about the insurance plans. Smooth. Subtle. After that it was lots of sitting and doing nothing while my supervisor urged me to "keep busy with something."

On the other hand, my new house is lovely. The cats are finally getting along well... Um, in one case it's more of an avoiding game, but three of them are getting on smashingly. I still have a bit of rearranging and organizing to do, but I am feeling rather moved in and comfortable. So far, so good. Hopefully pictures are in store for you .

Update on the Newness

On Thursday, I started my new job at the Humane Society. I'm not all that crazy about it, but there are some nice people and cute animals there. It is a very job-y job - a place of transition, which I guess is good for me. Interestingly, 90+% of the employees there are women. My supervisor was not at work when I started because she went into early labor... There are lots of pregnancies going on there.
I also have a new house! It is very pretty... much more pretty now that I am not carrying all my stuff (or worrying about carrying all my stuff). The move was taxing, but has passed. Now, I have a pile of stuff to sell when I get around to it. The house has two resident cats (who are enormous), and they met my babies today. There was one attack too many, so my kitties are confined to my bedroom for now. Hopefully, they will be able to integrate into the household smoothly in time.
With any luck, I will write something interesting here soon.