In the Pink

Yesterday I received a lovely, actual-handwritten-on-paper note from Minarae, thanking me for an embarrassingly paltry donation I made to her Breast Cancer 3-Day fund. She also enclosed a pink wristband.

Now, for the record, I'm fairly tired of the whole wristband thing. Sure, it was awesome when the LIVESTRONG bracelets first came out, because who doesn't love Lance Armstrong? (America-haters, that's who.) And they're a great idea, really, for people who truly and passionately support a certain cause. But the whole craze took a fairly distasteful turn when the yellow bands became some sort of must-have fashion accessory and everybody was wearing them, even if they'd only given the actual charity a dollar just to get the band, or got one from someone giving them away for free at the office.

And now it's officially gotten out of hand, what with collector's sites selling 400 frillion different bands along with retired Beanie Babies and all these half-wits running around wearing three or four different bracelets that COORDINATE WITH THEIR OUTFITS, and oh my God, those rainbow ones are soooo cute. Who do you have to support to get that one?

Please don't think I'm bashing everybody who wears a wristband. Just, you know, the assholes.

Because I'm sure as hell going to wear this pink one.

Because my mom's been diagnosed with breast cancer.

When my mom called to tell me about the lump, it barely registered. Between my mom, my sister and I, the doctors have found dozens and dozens of lumps. We all have the fibrocystic breast disease. Which is not so much of a "disease" as is it is a "huge pain in the boobs," because our breasts ALWAYS have cysts and lumps and suspicious activity going on, but in the end, the lumps are ALWAYS benign. ALWAYS, I tell you. I'm only 27 and have already had four breast ultrasounds, one mammogram and three aspirations of suspicious-yet-benign cysts. Lumps are just not a Big Scary Thing around here.

And unlike my poor dad, whose entire life in one experiment in medical terror after another, my mom's always been the healthy one.

So when she called to say her doctor was ordering a biopsy on yet another lump, we kind of mutual-eye-rolled and sighed because DUH, it's just another cyst that's absorbed some blood so it looks abnormal but everything will be fine in the end and when are you coming down to help me paint the baby's room?

She won't be coming down to paint the baby's room. Instead she'll be having her second surgery in a month to remove more breast tissue because they aren't satisfied with the margins they got the first time around.

And then she'll be starting radiation.

And then she'll be starting a five-year drug regimen to fight the other strain of breast cancer she has, because oh yeah, she's got two different kinds blah blah blah lots of letters and abbreviations and one strain is apparently scary and aggressive and does this mean you won't be able to come down and help me take care of the baby after Jason goes back to work? Because I don't know what I'm doing and want my mommy?

Her prognosis is good. Her oncologist is confident they caught it early enough. Huge props and shout-outs to routine mammograms.

But still. I'm wearing the damn wristband. And writing a bigger check next time.

Because that one-in-eight statistic is suddenly talking about my mother. And my baby's Nana. And we both need her around for a good, long time.

Wednesday Advice Smackdown

USUAL SUCKAGE DISCLAIMER BLAH BLAH BLAH: I have been up for many, many hours already as Cabinet Man was at our house at 6 am today for the final, official, swear-to-God-we're-actually-going-to-make-progress measurement of our kitchen.  So now we can order our cabinets and countertops and it looks like all our home renovations (which I figured would start in June), will start sometime in August. Which means I CANNOT GIVE BIRTH EARLY OR ELSE THERE WILL BE NO KITCHEN. Not that the baby will likely care about the kitchen, as I'll be his own personal feeding station, but I WILL CARE DEEPLY, as I plan to eat a lot of microwaveable popcorn while on maternity leave.

In other news, I went to the dermatologist this morning to get some various weird pregnancy-related skin things checked out. (All fine, just weird.) And in case you've ever wondered what sort of neighborhood I live in, consider this sign on display at the dermatologist's office.

Good to know! Thanks doc!

(Photo courtesy of my new! camera! phone! That I have had for two weeks and only recently learned how to 1) take pictures, and 2) get said pictures off the phone, because I'm an idiot who threw out the user's manual.)

And now on with that stupid advice thing.

Amalah,

I've been keeping up with your site for a few months now and I wanted to heap piles of praise your way. Thank you, thank you for sharing your life with all of us.

I recently bought a dress from eBay. I've never bought clothing online before (I buy most clothes based on texture and fabric, so Internet shopping scares me). It's a silk, strapless Philip DiCaprio at a price I could not beat. The dress should arrive on my doorstep today, but I'm already sure it will be about two sizes too big. I get the sense that you hover at the bottom of the size scale. I live there, too.

So here is my dilemma, which I humbly submit to your Internet/DC/beauty expertise. First, do you have any general Internet clothing shopping tips -- warning signs, questions to ask sellers, etc.? But more urgently, what do I do with my new, too big dress? I'd like to take it to a tailor (I live in NW DC), but I don't know how to find someone reputable. I also don't know what to say to them, other than "make it fit better." Is there a special tailor lingo? Is it okay to take it to a dry cleaners with a sign in the window screaming "ALTERATIONS," or should I go to a fancy department store? How do I get the best bargain, and what is a reasonable price?

Ellen

I've bought stuff off eBay too -- most notably a designer bridesmaid dress for $50. It was exactly my size, but the seller neglected to mention that she'd had the dress altered down to a size zero, or possibly a negative 12. So, you know, that's my new top question to ask: Has the item been altered, and if so, was any fabric cut? (I also won't buy anything from super-inexperienced sellers, anyone without a lot of positive feedback, or from sellers who don't use PayPal and require that I mail them a check or something before they'll ship the item out. And since I mostly use eBay for designer stuff, I look for stuff that's "NWT" (new with tags) and a guarantee of authenticity.)

Luckily for my dress, nothing had been cut from the dress, so after a few minutes of ripping out seams I was able to actually get the thing on and not feel like such a whale compared to the dress' previous owner, who may or may not have have been a very tall nine-year-old girl.

Then I took it to my mom's house to have her run some of seams BACK in because I have no breasts.

But since my mom does not moonlight as a seamstress unless I show up whining, garment in hand, trying to save money because I will spend $90 on pants but won't pay $10 to have them hemmed, I guess that doesn't help you much.

Unless you've heard really good things about a dry cleaners' tailoring services, I wouldn't risk taking a nice, irreplaceable dress there. Maybe do a test run and have them hem some pants or take in a dress that you don't care so much about first. Otherwise, ask your friends for recommendations. Call a bridal shop and ask where they send their customers for alterations. Or just take it to Nordstrom's, because they're awesome and would probably alter a burlap sack for you and not even bat an eye.

OR! We could ask my DC-area readers for their tailoring recommendations. Yes, let's do that too. Anyone?

Hello!

I have a head full of thick (THICK!) yet fine and oily hair. It’s naturally wavy so if I get it layered just right it curls up real nice on its own. I’m using Suave Volumizing Shampoo and Conditioner (compare to Matrix!) and was wondering if you knew of any other products that work to get curl without weighing down hair.

If my hair wasn’t oily it wouldn’t be such an issue. I don’t usually dry my hair, just my bangs (I was blessed with two cowlicks, yay me).

BTW, I took your advice on training bangs to go in a certain style and it worked for me.

Thanks!
Tanya

Suave shampoo? Like from the drugstore?

Oy, the blow to my heart, it hurts.

I used to think I had really oily hair too, back in high school and college. I was also using drugstore-brand shampoos and conditioners. (Pantene, bleharrrgh.) Guess what! My hair is not so very oily after all. It just gets angry at cheapness and inferiority. Please, throw out the Suave and invest in a salon-quality shampoo. Pleeeeease.

My absolute favorite volumizing shampoo and conditioner are from the Graham Webb Halo line. They're perfect for ultra-fine hair like ours because they're very light and gentle, but still do a fabulous job of getting rid of product build-up so our roots stay squeaky-clean and oil-free all day. Use the shampoo ONLY on your roots, and use the conditioner ONLY on your ends. I cannot stress this enough.

If you're still looking for some extra curl, try Catwalk Curls Rock Booster, from the good people who brought us my beloved Bed Head line. Spray it on wet hair (avoiding your roots and bangs, of course), scrunch a couple times and let dry. Ta-da! It's an ultra-light aerosol spray, and as long as you're following the roots-and-ends rule of shampoo and conditioner, you should be able to use it without seeing any extra oil or ickiness.

Dear Amalah,

I recently went to the salon (yesterday) for a change. I wanted dark copper/red on the underside of my hair with kicky blonde and dark copper/red highlights on the top. I ended up looking like Donatella Versace, which as you can imagine, was so very NOT the look I was going for. There are no copper/red highlights or chunks anywhere to be found on my head. Yet, I now have dark roots and orange hair when I once had naturally dark blonde hair. What should I do? Please refer to orange photo of self.

Shano

Well, for starters, I don't think you look very orange at all. You do look washed out, though, because you're right -- there's no contrast or highlights anywhere in your hair.

For seconders, copper and red highlights on blonde hair are REALLY difficult to achieve. I tried strawberry blonde highlights once, and just ended up looking...more blonde. Like platinum blonde with some vague goldish tones that mostly looked like I'd done a peroxide bottle-job on myself. And this was at a very nice salon with my favorite colorist in the world. (Who just had her baby! And who will be coming back to work soon! Hallelujah! Saints be praised and etc.!)

So I'm not surprised your highlights didn't work out as planned. But the only way to fix your color is to get...well, more highlights.

Or more accurately, you need lowlights. Preferably in your natural shade of dark blonde, possibly a shade darker to anticipate for fading. But before you get more color on you hair (which from your photo looks like it's fairly fine and probably in agony after all the coloring you've had already), take some time to get your hair really healthy and re-moisturized.

Highlights on dried-out, over-processed hair are ALWAYS a disaster. The color sets really quickly and never comes out as anticipated, and then fades to some other non-anticipated color within a week.

So. Buy a deep conditioner or hot oil treatment, and see if your salon offers a professional deep conditioning treatment. Splurge for one about a week before you plan to re-color, and use a deep or restorative conditioner (on. your. ends.) at home every day after that. Then go back to the salon and tell them you want lowlights in your natural color. Go for small foils -- no big crazy chunks or anything, and get your whole head done. That should bring down the blonde!blonde!blonde! to a more natural and non-Donatella level.

Dear Amalah,

I am a professional bellydancer in need of hair help!

I like to set my hair in steam rollers and wear it loosely curled for shows. When I first come out to do a show, it looks great (like this). The problem is, I sweat a LOT when I dance, and my hair looks like that pretty picture for about 3 minutes. Then it starts to melt (like this), and then it completely falls apart. And this is only for the FIRST show - I may have up to four in a single night.

So my question is - is there ANY product that will keep my hair from doing the total meltdown?? I have worn three-quarter falls and such in the past to avoid this issue entirely, but I tend to be more timid when I'm dancing with fake hair, because I'm afraid it will slide out and land in somebody's hummus plate or something. Please help! :)

Yours,
Lucy

MAN, my life is so boring. I wish I did something cool like professional belly dancing. And I wish I didn't have the overwhelming urge to make some stupid joke about my belly always dancing these days because of the wee karate-chopper I'm currently incubating, because that is LAME and STUPID.

What is also stupid is that you've kind of stumped me. If you're sweating a lot, the LAST thing I can recommend are a lot of styling products in your hair, because they'll melt down along with your hair (possibly pulling the curl out even faster), and could even end up running down your face and into your eyes, which would NOT be good, and you could sue me for beauty-product-related blinding.

And that's the reason that gymnasts, cheerleaders and ballet dancers wear their hair slicked back in tight buns and ponytails and use 400 bobby pins. Is there some sort of hair code or rule for belly dancing that says your hair should be completely down and free? You might want to experiment with pinning just the front of your hair back, since the sweat factor is usually the worst right along the forehead and hairline. This way, the meltdown won't be quite so noticeable at first, since the back of your hair should hold on to the curl a little longer.

If that's not an option, you could try a few of the tips I gleaned from some ballroom and Irish step dance sites, where the participants do wear their hair down and curled.

They recommend using soft curlers instead of hot rollers. (That girl on the homepage looks extremely freaky and Raggedy-Anne-like, but I get what they're going for. You just need to not use so damn many curlers or find a larger-sized brand.) Curls created with heat or steam are not going to be as tight or long-lasting as curls from letting wet hair dry naturally while wrapped tightly in curlers. Curlers are a pain in the ass, of course, since it takes FOREVER for hair to dry when wrapped up all tight, so unless you can sleep with them in, you're walking around with curlers in your hair ALL DAY.

But! Those curls look like they'd make it through at least two or three shows, and could probably be re-formed with some scrunching and extra hairspray fairly easily.

So you could either: 1) Put the curlers in at night, sleep on them, take them out in the morning and wrap your head loosely in a bandanna or scarf during the day to protect the curls until your show, or 2) Put the curlers in a couple hours before the show and try to speed up the process with a blowdryer (again, adding heat might make for less durable curls, but I know we all have reasonable limits for how much time we want to devote to our quest for the perfect hair).

So try that, or like, AquaNet hairspray. I played field hockey in junior high and we'd all spray up our big, curled-up bangs with AquaNet before our games and hell, my bangs stayed pretty damn big the whole time. (Of course, I was not a very good player and probably spent most of my time on the field trying to stay as far away from the actual hockey aspect of the game as possible.)

Blah blah blah advice@amalah.com big-ass backlog don't expect and answer right away and if you're asking about hair, PLEASE include a photo (which I won't post unless you specifically tell me that's okay) and as many details as possible instead of just sending me questions that say, "I have hair on my head. What products should I be using?" Because I don't know. Have you tried mayonnaise?

The Belly At Dawn

(Boxers and undershirt from the Jason Storch collection. Permission was not obtained for their usage in this photo nor as pajamas the night before. The author of this website makes no claims of permanent ownership, however, she maintains that she has full property rights to any and all underwear currently in her house, particularly if it's the only stuff that fits.)

(Also, she is not liable for damages if undershirt is returned in a permanently stretched-out condition, because it was totally like that when she found it.)

Four Days Later & Still A Big Sappy Pile of Sap

Dear Baby Boy,

First, you need to know something about your mama. She is not the type of girl who writes letters to unborn babies and posts them on the Internet. She doesn't use those pregnancy counters or little animated blinking babies or anything to indicate that she has a warm gooey center of sentimentality.

She also never thought she'd be the type to refer to herself as "Mama" in the third person, at least not until you were here and screaming inconsolably and she would try to reason with you by calming yelling back that MAMA'S EARS ARE HURTY NOW, PLEASE PLEASE CEASE WITH THE SCREAMING.

It's not that you weren't loved or wanted or the greatest thing that ever happened to me ('cause you are, already), it's just that I am not "mushy," which was what I used to call kissing scenes in movies when I was a little girl, so I'm guessing that's a word you'll understand soon if you're anything like me.

I loved you from the instant I found out you existed. And it was a fierce, protective love. I'd have given anything to protect you from the bad things that happen to tiny, tiny embryos in those early weeks of life. I ate salads and took vitamins and stressed about whether I was taking the right vitamins and if I should take another vitamin if I possibly threw up that last vitamin because oh, my God, I was so sick.

But I was mostly loving and protecting the idea of you. I mean, you looked like this. I couldn't quite believe that little blob was going to turn into an actual person, but by gum, I was going to do everything I could to give that blob a fighting chance.

There were two times when I thought I'd lost you. The first time, you were still just our little blob. The second time, we knew you were our little boy. I felt like I'd failed.  It was my job to keep you safe and growing and I'd let you down.

(You turned out to be okay both times, in case you were wondering.)

But that's the way it was, before I knew who you were. You were this strange little being inside me who would kick me (haaaard) every once in awhile to remind me of your presence. I avoided alcohol and got enough iron; and in turn, you'd delight your dad and me with the mysterious bulges and rolls under my belly. That was the deal, and I eventually came to believe that you might actually come out one day and complete our little family.

And then I saw your face.

And you're an actual person now.

I wasn't prepared for that moment. Your dad and I planned the 4D sonogram months in advance. We invited your grandparents and told them it would be "cool." I don't think they really understood what they'd be seeing.

Apparently, neither did we.

Your face appeared on a monitor and everyone in the room sucked in their breath. Your dad was sitting on a couch on the other side of the room and came running to my side to grab my hand and kiss my head and we just stared at you in absolute awe.

Like, where did this kid come from?

And how come I love him so much?

You're no longer just an idea. You're my son.

(The mind, how it boggles.)

So there you go, little guy. A very disorganized letter that takes a very long time to get to the point. Which is that I love you more and more with each passing day, to the point where my heart just might burst.

Which I probably could have just said, but like I mentioned before, I'm not the type who usually writes stuff like this, so I don't quite have the hang of it.

So hi. Love you. Crazy about you. Think you're the greatest thing since sliced bread and the most beautiful negative-12-week-old baby in the entire world.

Not that I'm biased or anything.

Love,

Mama

P.S. I think you have my chin. You're welcome. It's a good chin.

Best of one  +  best of the other - my neuroses  x  our love for each other  =  you.

Probably Not the Last Time Baby Pictures Will Reduce Me to a Sappy Pile of Sap

We had one of those fancy new-fangled yuppie-riffic 4D ultrasound things today.

And damn, I'm so blown away and totally in love with my little boy that I'm rendered completely snarkless. I mean, look! A baby! Who is mine!

He spent most of the session hiding behind his hands and sucking on his toes, but he eventually cooperated and let us get a good look at his beautiful little face.

We invited our parents to attend, which meant there were six slightly blubbering adults crammed into the same room.

My mom thinks he looks like me.

10 fingers, 10 toes. Everything looks perfect.

Also cute little ears.

12 more weeks until he's here. I seriously can't wait.

It was great to meet you today, little guy. Your mama and daddy love you. A lot. 

 

In Case Anyone Thought I Was Kidding...

Steve says, "Crikey! That's a whole lotta Rubbermaid, mate!"

So I think we have enough airtight containers. Now we just need some food.

(Please note the sad little cloves of garlic, the sole survivors of the Great Kitchen Purge of 2005. They wonder, "Why were we spared? What strange plastic prison is this? What happened to our dear friend French Baguette, upon whom we were to be roasted and oiled and turned into delicious, delicious garlic bread?" And then they weep, but no one can hear, for the seal, it is airtight.)

Last night's BugWatch Patrol uncovered five of the little bastards: three dead, two alive. They were promptly vacuumed.

Behold! The nesting instinct in action!

Also, pregnancy arms! Squashy!

The Weevils & Me

The sole purpose of this post is to make amalah.com the number one Google search result for anyone looking for "goddamn+flour+beetles+must+destroy+haaaate."

So. We discovered a little bug problem in our kitchen. Wee, wee little bugs.

Noted bug wrangler Steve Dirwin, aka Flour Beetle Dundee, is on hand today to provide a little background information about the yicky, nasty bugs.

Amy: Good morning, Steve.

Steve: Crikey!

Amy: Tell the nice people about the Confused Flour Beetle.

Steve: Amy, the Confused Flour Beetle is a gorgeous little crittah. Flat, shiny-red and elongated, it can grow to a massive 1/8th of an inch long! Almost the size of a grain of rice! Crimeny! It looks just like the Red Flour Beetle, except for a straight-sided thorax and four-segment antennae. In fact, you can only tell the difference between these little guys if you stick your thumb up their assholes.

Amy: Well, there's no need to do that.

Steve: Are you sure? I can demonstrate...

Amy: Am sure. Where do these bugs come from?

Steve: Most people bring them into their homes straight from the store. They can lurk inside any innocent-looking bag of flour and then take over from there. Within a few weeks you've got yourself a full-scale infestation, with the little buggahs crawling through all your dry goods, even chewing right through unopened packaging!

Amy: Ew. I'm all itchy now.

Steve: And then they've got free reign...feeding on your flour, cornmeal, chopped nuts, cereal and rice...creeping through the pet food and the chocolate chips...chomping away at your crackers and pasta and the microwaveable oatmeal packets...laying eggs in the raisins and Duncan Hines brownie mixes...

Amy: OH MY GOD! STOP!

Steve: Females lay about three to five eggs every day, with the wormlike little larvae hatching in about five days. Eggs are covered in a sticky, milky-white substance that adheres to...

Amy: This is because I wouldn't let you stick your thumb up the bug's ass, isn't it?

Steve: Come on! This is fascinatin' stuff! Look at this gorgeous little guy! Look what happens when I throw some cracker crumbs his way!

Amy: I don't want to look, and you can't make me.

Steve: Crikey!

We're pretty sure our personal little infestation started with an honest, homey-looking bag of organic bread crumbs we purchased at Whole Foods. The bag was closed with a simple twist-tie, as vacuum seals are probably killing our wildlife and leaking deadly toxins into our bread crumbs, and don't you want to support your hardworking local bread crumb co-op that doesn't go for that "fancy" "corporate" "packaging" instead?

(I'm thinking of printing up t-shirts that say, "I spent twice as much on my groceries and all I got was this lousy beetle infestation." Either that, or "Fuck You, Whole Foods.")

To be fair, we were kind of asking for a bug problem. We're sort of...lazy like that.

Case in point: roaches are a fact of life for any city-dweller, yet I always forget to replace the 473 roach traps I have strategically scattered throughout my tiny condo.  That is, until I pull back the shower curtain one morning and WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT IN THE TUB OH MY GOD IT'S A ROACH JASON JASON JASON COME DO SOMETHING WHILE I SHRIEK IN HELPLESS HORROR FROM ATOP THE SINK.

Then I remember to go buy 500 new traps that very day. Six months later? Rinse, repeat, etc.

But our cabinets! Oh, what a disaster they were. I own three airtight glass canisters for flour and sugar and such, but I kind of missed the point of owning airtight glass canisters. I'd buy a huge bag of flour, dump half of it in the airtight glass canister, then kind of just roll up the bag and shove it in the back of the cabinet with the cornmeal and the rye flour and the other bags of grains that I bought when I was totally planning to use my breadmachine on a regular basis.

I currently have no idea where my breadmachine even is.

And every Christmas I decide to bake cookies. So I load up on chocolate chips and chopped pecans and brown sugar -- completely forgetting that I bought all this shit last year and never made a single blessed batch of cookies, and the stuff is still sitting in my cabinets, probably open, because I would at least rip open the chocolate chips to eat a few before putting them away.

Steve: So basically, the Storch household is a lush, fertile breeding ground for all sorts of nasty buggahs and pests, and you should never attempt to enter it without protective goggles and mosquito netting.

Anyway.

So what should you do when you discover a flour beetle outbreak?

First, you need to THROW OUT everything that's infested. Or, if you're like us, you just THROW OUT EVERYTHING, AND I MEAN EVERYTHING, BECAUSE EWWWWWWWWWW.

You may think I'm kidding, but I'm not. We threw out three cabinets' worth of food. I believe we kept some canned soup, a jar of roasted red peppers, three cloves of garlic and a bottle of vanilla extract.

(I'm still eyeing that vanilla extract very suspiciously.)

And unless you can immediately hand all the infested food directly over to the garbage truck, put everything in Ziploc bags.

Second, you need to vacuum like you have never vacuumed before. The bugs can apparently live for YEARS on crumbs in the cracks and edges of your cabinets. So vacuum the cabinets. And then vacuum the countertops. And then vacuum again and again until your husband appears in the doorway at 2 a.m., sobbing, begging you to put the vacuum down and come to bed, please.

Third, since we're talking about your kitchen, where you (presumably) will one day feel brave enough to store food products once again, you don't want to start blasting the cabinets with insecticide and bleach and other toxic cleansers. And that's not just the hippie-Whole-Foods-shopper in me talking. That's the all-knowing Internet and the surprisingly honest exterminator I spoke to talking.

It's hard to resist. I understand. My first impulse was to grab the Raid and smoke those little shits to oblivion.

But you know, I'd like to not poison myself. Or my unborn child. Am funny like that. Plus, I remember what happened in college after my roommate decided to store her bottle of Clorox in the same plastic crate as our groceries. ("This rice tastes like bleach for some reason." "Heh, you're so high." "Well, yeah, but still. This rice tastes like bleach.")

So after vacuuming, scrub the cabinets down with a low-toxicity cleanser -- or even just soap and water. The goal is really to just get rid of every remaining speck of crumbly food goodness that will keep the fuckers alive. The vacuum sucks out the actual bugs and eggs, so you really don't need to go all beserk with trying to poison them, as richly satisfying an experience as that may be.

If possible, remove the shelves from your cabinets when you scrub. We couldn't figure out why in hell the bugs kept returning to this one particular cabinet when we'd vacuumed and washed and sprayed and EVERYTHING until Jason removed one of the shelves and turned it over -- only to find a FREAKING BEETLE BUFFET of flour and cornstarch residue all over the bottom.

You can try pheromone traps or Baygon aerosol (to be used ONLY in cracks and crevices), but these tactics are mostly recommended for restaurants, schools or other "food handling establishments" (COUGH COUGH WHOLE FOODS COUGH), where the problem is widespread and recurring. I am hopeful it will not come to this for us, however, I will do it if I have to, I swear to God, so don't fucking PUSH ME, you evil little bugs.

And a couple householdy message boards recommended sticking bay leaves in infested cabinets and drawers. Actual entomology sites claimed this was an old wives' tale and completely useless. I figured, what the hell, and scattered bay leaves all over the damn place.

Guess what! It's an old wives' tale. Absolutely no effect at all, except to give the bugs something to hide under when I went on vacuum patrol.

Anyway. It's been a couple days since our last bug sighting. We're still vacuuming the cabinets like insane people, especially since those very cabinets are slated to get demolished this month when our shiny new kitchen gets installed, but OH MY GOD, I will CRY if I find a bug in my shiny new kitchen, so I'm determined to kill the outbreak dead dead dead.

(See also: Nesting, pregnancy.)

We also purchased an insane number of airtight containers for all pet food and treats, as well as any and all possible foodstuffs that we one day may buy, once the hurt and shame of the beetle outbreak fades from our hearts.

(To the lovely couple who recognized Jason and me at Balducci's this weekend: Hi! And thanks for reading. And for asking about Ceiba's eyes. And no, I didn't end up buying that package of bucatini pasta I was holding and weirdly gesturing with the whole time we were talking, because I just don't feel ready to commit to new dry goods, no matter how well-sealed or wildly overpriced.)