Okay.  Just don’t try to tell me that the average life of a Housefly is 28 days!  I know better. I have been haunted and taunted by two of the evil species for – oh it must be at least a month!

It all began innocently enough.

I woke up one pleasant California morning, to a perfect (I thought) day.  The sky was blue and clear, the winds just enough to ruffle the trees.  The sounds of birds and dogs and an occasional siren wafted across the lawn. I opened the door to welcome all of that into my Tiny House.

First thing to ripple through the door was the aroma of fresh made coffee, followed by the scent of roses in the air.  (Scratch that.  I didn’t really stop to smell the roses.)  But then a new sound, a low buzzy kind of irritating noise reached me…and in flew Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in the guise of Houseflies.

Even their entrance was irksome. They didn’t slip thru subtly. No.  They buzzed and circled and gyrated in a most ostentatious manner. They whirled about my head and aimed right for the (open) jelly jar.

“Ah ha!” said I to me. “Gotcha1” and I slammed the lid on.

But of course I didn’t. “Gotcha.” Or hadn’t.  Whatever. I missed.

And so began a long, challenging and frustrating war.

On the first day of battle I discovered that I had no fly swatters in my Tiny House…so I chased the little monsters with folded up newspapers. On the second day I visited Walmart and bought a fly swatter….and on the third day, I bought five so that wherever and whenever they landed, I was within reach of a weapon. I swatted and swung and I skulked around the house, but they were always there. I felt like a character in a Hitchcock movie being driven mad by invaders.

Friends began to worry for my sanity, I think.  Apparently they believed that if they said “But Betty, those can’t be the same flies” often enough I would believe them.  But they were wrong.  I recognized my enemies and I hated them.

By this time it was definitely personal.

Then one morning I woke up as usual, grabbed one of the fly swatters and opened the door…sure enough, in they flew. I admit I snapped.  I whirled and twirled around that house like a mad woman, but they eluded me.  I lost track of them for a while and thought, perhaps, they had given up.

But no!  There, on my desk lay my yellow fly swatter. And there, too, were Jekyll and Hyde, resting luxuriously on said weapon.  I grabbed the nearest swatter – the red one as I remember – and crept quietly up behind them.

I paused.  I studied. I took a practice swing and then slammed my bright red swatter down on the pale, weak yellow one.  It clattered to the floor, followed by a cup which fell off the desk from the vibration.

Then there was a glorious moment when I realized I didn’t hear that buzz.  And then I did.  Jekyll and Hyde rose like Phoenix from the debris and flew gracefully out the open door.

Jekyll gave me the one wing salute as they left.

*********************       For those of you who have not met my newest favorite pet….Let me introduce Milo, the Wonder Dog…..Milo is the one on the right…the purple pup to HIS right is Lavender…Milo has already acknowledged that Lavender is a scent…not a toy.

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