Tuesday June 12- Night of the Living Dead

Night of the Living Dead Well, ten hours on the ICW is a long day for our group. As I keep pointing out, we aren't as young as we used to be. So, after our nice dinner and one round of Yachtzee,we all headed off to bed. Since I was not really tired enough to be in bed at 8:30, I used a half hour to listen to the end of my book on tape. You cannot imagine my surprise when I took off the earphones to hear slap...slap...thwack....thwack....ow...slap.... Using my excellent first aid training, I immediately said, "Is everyone okay?" all I got back was, "MOSQUITOS!" And so the night of the living dead began. The bloodsuckers were everywhere. There were so many that you could literally kill two or three with one swat of the new fly swatters (good thing we bought two of them). And, every time you killed one, you saw five more. So, for the next hour, we spent our time doing nothing but killing mosquitos. Well, most of us did. Mike was so tired that he did not move for the beginning of our quest to kill all the bloodsuckers. Jacob killed enough in his cabin so that he thought he would be safe if he just went in and closed the door. No one mentioned that he would eventually have to go to the bathroom - which would just let them in. Of course, I am sure he was hoping we would kill them all for him. And, certainly we tried. Of course, our efforts did result in some casualties. Peggy was itching all over. I had to find the Benedryl spray for her. And then there is poor Carol. She is very allergic to mosquito bites - they end up giving her really gigantic welts. And, early in the battle, she already had ten welts that she could see. I never told her about the three I could see high up on the back of her arm. So we fought on against the hordes. Sometimes it felt as though they were reproducing faster than we could swat them. We were never able to figure out for sure where they all came from. After all, we had closed all the hatches earlier on because it had started to rain. When we had finally killed enough to feel as though we might be able to sleep, we fell back into our beds. Carol had the best promise of sleep- I made sure she TOOK Benedryl. And, of course, there is the fact that she sealed herself into her bunk with duct tape and mosquito netting(yes, another weird item from our luggage). Then, before she took the Benedryl, she killed all the Mosquitos she could find in her bunk area. I hope she got them all. So, it is morning again. Mike hoped for an early start with his crew. But, even he has commented on the fact that we seem to be trapped. There are Mosquitos between the screen and the door. Yes, the evil bloodsuckers got through our defenses. I am hoping that they will disappear as it gets light. After all, they did not appear until it got really dark. Hope springs eternal. Finally, the biggest victim of the bloodbath was LUX. I will have to spend a lot of time today washing down walls to get rid of the blood smears and the dead bodies. And now we are trying to prepare to leave mosquito heaven- especially since it is now trying to turn into noseeum heaven. Carol is trying to do waypoint entries for the day. Unfortunately, she is either drunk or still suffering after effects from a night on Benedryl. Don't laugh, dear readers. You don't know what it's like. First she was singing weird songs that we thought were drinking songs. She claims they were from the Mikado, but I don't know..... Then I asked her for my IPad to add her to this blog. She handed me a duster. Then she started laughing and laughing. She's not quite to hysteria, but I can tell you that it is a short trip there for most of us at this point. Except, of course, Mike. He can't figure out what the fuss is all about. For example, we all said we would have to wash sheets today to get the bug carcasses and blood off them. He said, "Why do that? Maybe the bug remains will scare off other bugs." We sent him outside to do all the get the boat ready stuff. And, Peggy has moved on from Queen of the Flies to Queen of the Flying Pestilence. She is killing Mosquitos and gnats while she sings, "And another one bites the dust." Jacob has gone back to bed. Carol is busy trying to simultaneously brush her teeth and kill more Mosquitos in the bathroom. We're also trying to kill little gnats, but they are faster than we are. Oh, an announcement from Peggy. "Okay. I am now going into the head with the fly swatter." We are now approaching our second hour underway. Carol has gone back to bed. Peggy and I are holed up on the settee. Mike is alone at the helm. Oh, wait. His best friend, Otto Helm, is out there with him. Good thing Otto is in charge. Mike is busy swatting insects. Yes, insects. He killed two crickets this morning. Now, how did they get to the boat? Probably the gigantic killer Mosquitos dragged them here, huh?