antz

every summertime, i get insects crawling out of the woodwork in my apartment. this season, my first summer in this new apartment, its a lot of ants. so far, they've limited their activities and grazing to the kitchen sink. it seems funny because back home, it doesn't take long for ants to be where you don't want them to be: areas with food. my ants here haven't discovered my dining table yet, which has boxes of cereals, a bag of cheetos, bread, sugar dispenser, chocolate powder, and a can of pringles. i mean, its ant heaven.


my ants usually converge on the sink when i leave used pans and plates temporarily, and try to salvage any scraps they can find. when i catch them milling about the area, its deluge time, baby! there's a certain amount of glee (and ok, ok, sadism) to wash them insects down the drain. hey, what do you want me to do, pick them one by one and deposit them on the window sill, say hello, bye-bye? you crazy.

to reinforce my theory that ants here are dumb (well, i guess the Philippine ants are similar), they don't learn from the experience. ever. i mean, if i were ever tried in a court of law in the Insect Kingdom, i'd be serving multiple life sentences, minimum, for being the worst serial killer of ants in the last few weeks. i could argue that perhaps some ants didn't drown, and they're still finding their way down in those drainage pipes. that could cut my sentence by about, oh say, a few decades. but anyway - ants never learn that they're gonna get swept down the kitchen drain when they hang around there. shouldn't the survivors communicate this danger to their brethren and preach about finding less-risky food ventures?

so they keep showing up everytime i wander by the sink. i even saw them trying for my upper shelves and cupboards. i finally got out and bought a can of Raid insect spray. sprayed the lot of them, and they all died. sprayed along the nooks and crannies. i see less and less of them showing up now. the insecticide must be working.

now i feel like saddam gassing the Kurds. he didn't feel any remorse either.