ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, September 10, 1996 TAG: 9609100006
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
COLUMN: reporter's notebook
SOURCE: MARK CLOTHIER
Like a thousand others last month, I moved to Blacksburg, unloaded my stuff and set up shop.
I picked a place kind of in the mountains. A city guy by nature, I figured, I should live someplace a little more indicative of my new home than the typical apartment complex.
All well and good.
What I didn't plan on was roommates. But maybe one-half hour into my move I was on my hands and knees, setting up my bed when I noticed what looked like dark, mobile freckles on my arms. Upon closer inspection, they proved to be fleas. And not just one or two, but lots.
Now, for my money, fleas are about the nastiest thing going. Had my new home been littered with a cooler insect like, say, ants, I'd have had an easier time coping. Most ants don't bite, and they can lift like, I don't know, eight times their body weight. That's at least admirable. It'd be a starting point for us, something to build on.
With fleas, the positive begins and ends with jumping. They can leap an amazing distance. I know, I watched them do it for two weeks. This, admittedly, is kind of impressive. But what initially seems like a positive quickly becomes negative. The jumping, you see, makes it more difficult to catch and kill them if you happen to be employing the one-by-one hunt-and crush-method of flea removal, which I was.
When I told my landlord of the problem the next day, he immediately called a pest control service and told me to stay in a hotel for the night while my place was bombed by professionals.
Next day, I came home. The place, reeking of Raid, was a bit hazy, so it was tough to tell if my little roommates were gone. I got down on my hands and knees to tempt them with some fresh arm meat. Within seconds, a couple took the bait. There did seem to be fewer fleas, enough to let me stay the night. But they multiply quickly so I didn't want to take any chances.
The next day, the pest folks came back out, gassed and bombed and sprayed. Later that day I checked. Still not flea-less.
After a few days and a few more unsuccessful treatments, a mild form of dementia began to set in, along with a feeling equal parts futility and helplessness.
I envisioned several of the more daredevil fleas - the ones that had landed successfully, and, yeah, even mockingly, on my leg - standing around their little flea weight room, specifically the squat rack, laughing about what feeble attempt we might throw at them next.
This only made matters worse. Chemical warfare proved fruitless, so, late one night, I decided to take charge. I got medieval.
I'd been lying on my bed looking over some file folders for work, and I had noticed how the fleas seemed to be drawn for some reason to the smooth, flat surface of my opened manila folder. I caught one between my thumb and forefinger and squeezed it - not enough to kill it but enough to make it stay put. I caught a few more in a similar fashion. I then arranged eight of their incapacitated little bodies in crude concentric circles - Stonehenge-fashion - then sat back and waited.
This arrangement served a dual purpose: there were now eight fewer fleas and, I hoped, it would also serve as a potent visual reminder for any flea that might chance upon Mead Manila Flats to return to their shag hinterlands and tell the others of the horrors awaiting them. I wanted the word spread among the Blacksburg flea community that Mark Clothier was one human with whom it was best not to mess.
Within 24 hours the fleas were gone - for now. I don't claim total victory. The pest company did come back a sixth time and drop the heavy artillery - enough to gas 'em back to the Stone Age and enough, my lawyer says, to qualify for Superfund money.
But I have a hard time believing there isn't some connection between their sudden departure and my makeshift Stonehenge. This is an increasingly high-tech world but fleas, god bless 'em, still speak a simpler language.
LENGTH: Medium: 74 linesby CNB