Mosquitoes - To Cluster or not to Cluster

“Look out for the mosquitoes,” my wife warned me, “there’s a whole bunch of them in the back yard.”

Those aren’t mosquitoes,” I retort, “they’re too small and mosquitoes don’t cluster like that.” Or so I thought.

I just returned from my evening walk and ran straight into a large cluster of mosquitoes, the biting kind. 

Fortunately, I managed to escape without donating blood. But I’m confused, do mosquitoes cluster or not?

I remember a canoe trip to northern Ontario about 40 years ago. Coming from Nova Scotia, I thought I knew mosquitoes but my eyes were opened to a new reality on the Groundhog River. As soon as the rain started, about an hour after we put our canoe in the water, they suddenly materialized out of thin air, billions of them. So thick you could hardly see through them.

It was a cluster, a really, really big cluster, about 150,000 square miles ending at the Saskatchewan border. I gave enough blood that week to save 17 lives.

Where did mosquitoes come from? Did God make them? Of course, God made everything, but surely He didn't make them to bite and suck blood in the Garden of Eden? That would have happened after the expulsion from the Garden and God’s cursing the earth. So mosquitoes must be part of the curse. They certainly invoke some cursing from some victims.

Will there be mosquitoes in Heaven? If there are what will they eat, or will they eat? They may actually be fun to play with in Heaven, though I can’t imagine how right now.

The Adventures of an Intrepid Guitar Student

July 30^th - In the midst of unprecedented straining of my guitar strings, I was interrupted by my beautiful wife who wanted me to bring a box in from the garage and then peel a pot of potatoes. No problem; 10 – 15 minutes and I’ll be back to my stringed rhapsody; or not!

I picked up some garbage on the way to the garage and dropped it into one of the two garbage cans beside the garage. Then I noticed that the cans were almost half full of water from the heavy rain showers over the past few days. Obviously, I had to dump them out. Along with the water came stuff that had been sitting in the water for days, including a bag of dog droppings; all landing on the alley.

Unfortunately, there was a hole in the bag that allowed lots of water to seep in. I had forgotten about the dog poop, and so picked up the bag to throw it back in the can when liquid manure began pouring out all over the alley. I quickly put it down and found another bag to put it in before sealing it and depositing it back in the can.

Fortunately, the other can was empty except for the water, so I used it for washing the poop down the alley to the storm sewer. I washed my hands and took the box into the house then went upstairs to peel potatoes.

However, Pat had noticed something had leaked out of the garbage bag by the sink and spread a sticky mess over the floor. I quickly looked for another garbage bag under the sink to put the first one into but couldn’t find one. In process of looking, I knocked over a full bottle of dish-washer liquid and cracked the bottle which proceeded to leak all over the floor.

“Great” I thought, “it’s just what I need to help clean up the sticky stuff.” (Note: this is absurdly positive for the glass half empty kind of guy.) So I cleaned up both messes together, found another bag to put the leaky garbage in and finally went to the fridge to get the potatoes out. However, when I pulled out the crisper I smelled and saw something that shouldn’t be there; another sticky mess. On Pat’s advice I sprayed it with a cleanser, left it while I peeled potatoes, then cleaned it out.

More than an hour, and several hand-washings later, I finally got back to my guitar practice. Just another day in the life of the intrepid guitar student.

July 28th - The intrepid (and somewhat beleaguered) guitar student on the back deck braving mosquitoes. Is it just me, or do the neighbours really wait for me to start practicing before starting their lawn mowers?



July 25th - The intrepid guitar student on a very blustery back deck. But I'm used to blustery; I have been married for 32 years.