Don't Let the Bedbugs Bite

About a month ago, management at my apartment complex performed an inspection for bedbugs. For those of you who don't know, bedbugs have invaded much of the east coast.

I've been on the lookout in my own apartment because, while I've slept with some vile nasty creatures in the past, I like to think that I've eliminated most of them from my personal life (or at least my bed). Also, I've visited New York since this invasion began, and who know what stowaways may have hopped aboard on my return trip. All of this is to say, that the Orkin guys came by, did a search, and I received no notification of squatters in my place, although I did have nightmares about gigantic, Burroughs-sized bugs biting huge red welts into me me all night long.

One of my neighbors was not so lucky. I received notice that "treatment for bedbugs is required within a home in close proximity to yours." That means that Orkin will launch a preemptive strike against the little beasties throughout the building. What good this will do, I have no idea. After all, this is a large building with a pretty steady turnover rate in residents due to a significant number of military personnel living here. Any number of new residents could become a new vector for the bugs and render all preemptive strikes futile.

To prepare for this assault, all residents must "move all furniture into the middle of the room, leaving the perimeter 100% accessible." Think about this. Look about your own home: sofa, chairs, bed, end tables, dresser, bookshelves (oh, dear god, the bookshelves with all of their books!), armoires (yes, I have an armoire, courtesy of my aunt's antique retention schedule), desks, filing cabinets -- anything up against the walls. Now, think of piling them into the middle of the room all at the same time. Is this geometrically possible in your place, even if you pretend that you are playing a life sized game of interior design Tetris?

Well, it sure as hell ain't in mine! I've had to broadly interpret "100%" accessible to mean that "you can see the perimeter, and probably reach it with one of those long nozzled sprayers." I haven't moved the larger of the bookcases, only removed the books from the bottom shelf so that the exterminators can get to the baseboards -- they are going after the baseboards, right, not the whole wall? If I were to move all of the books in order to move all of the shelves...well, there is no more space for that. None. All surfaces, including the floor, are occupied. The armoire is simply impossible. I had to put it together where it stands, and it will stand there until the undertakers come to take my cold, withered, ancient body away and dismantling it becomes my heirs' problem.

Anyway, I spent all morning yesterday moving everything that I could away from the walls. Then, I spent the afternoon awaiting the exterminators' arrival. Wait, wait, wait, wait. "Where the hell are they?" I thought. "They said Friday." Although, actually, when they say "Friday," they usually mean sometime next Wednesday, but I won't pass up a pissy tizzy if there is a pissy tizzy to work myself into.

Then, a thought crept up on me. I think of days in terms of days of the week, as in "Mondays I have to be here. Tuesdays I have to be there. Wednesdays, further on; and Thursdays back there." I don't think "on the 3rd, or the 4th, or the 8th." Even on my calendar, I don't so much look at the numbers of the days as the proximity of that square to the square that I just crossed off.

You see where this is going? I read "Your treatment has been scheduled for Friday -- November" some number. The number didn't register, just Friday. So, I moved everything for Friday. Mission accomplished, right?

Yes, mission accomplished. A week early.

My apartment is now in a state of chaos. Oddly enough, I like that. Not to live in permanently, but I've already grown used to it. Some of the pressure to "clean all the things!!!!111!!!" has dissipated. My desperate need to make the bed in order "to keep the forces of barbarism at bay," is no longer so desperate. Barbarism has taken over the nest. In fact, as I look around, I think, "why not paint the place?" After all, the walls are still the same shade of inoffensive taupe that becomes ever more offensive through its aggressive inoffensiveness that they were when I moved in. I've wanted to paint them some sunnier color for ages, usually in the middle of winter. Why not now, while all of the stuff is in the middle of the floor?

Why not? Well, the mound of grading that is just about as messy and chaotic as the piles of furniture and books in the middle of my floor. Then, the Douglass stuff behind it, which I would rather be doing. Then, the cost of paint and equipment (and I would need to buy brushes and pans and rollers and such, although I do have tape). Then, the magical thinking that, should I paint, I would end up having to move next week for one reason or another.

Still, the paint might give the place a little pizazz. Just the living room?

Alas, I shall be good and grade, hoping that the bedbug D-Day doesn't go down sometime in the next week..