The War of the Roaches...

War is hell. That's what they tell me. Well, lately it's been just that around casa de windrider.

You see, dear readers I have been fighting the biggest battle of my life the last week or so. One with Roaches!! Damn, it makes my skin crawl just typing that!! I have been struggling to eradicate some of the biggest, nastiest, 2+ inch and LARGER roaches I've ever come across in my entire life.

Seriously, I'm not kidding here...

It all started about a week or so ago.

Keep in mind that its the monsoon season here in the republic of El Florida, so we've had rain like every single solitary day. Everything is saturated with water. Now, I live on the second floor of a building that is probably 30 years old at least. Apparently the age of the building, coupled with all the water we've been getting has caused a mass migration of what are called "Palmetto Bugs"down here. (Personally, I prefer to call them "Big Fucking Roaches" but that's just me.)

It was around 2 or 3 in the morning. I have no idea why I had awoken but I was glancing at the clock and out of the corner of my eye I saw something move. I glanced towards it and saw a small shadow on the ceiling above my bed. It was hard to tell but this shadow seemed to be moving. I got out of bed and turned on the light just in time to see an index finger sized roach fall onto the comforter on my bed.

Needless to say, my sleep was over for the night, ahem.. I managed to get this humongo roach off my bedding and onto the floor where I pummeled it with a shoe, and disposed of it down the toilet. I decided to toss the bedding in the wash and turned on the TV as there was no way I was going back to sleep. Well, as I was sitting on the couch I glance towards the front door and see not one, but two more roaches running along the baseboard!!!

At this point I break out in an arachnoleptic fit complete with sailor-like curses, and sworn oaths to piss on the "thanks for visiting florida" sign when I leave this state for good. It was really something to behold.

I went to my chemical weapons storage area ( under the kitchen sink ) and pulled out a jug of bug spray and proceed to spay most of the house with it, thinking this will stop the problem.

Nah... Didn't happen... Not by a long shot...

I headed home from work that evening to find seven, yes you read that right... SEVEN of these monsters in various places in my apartment in the process of dying. Eeekk... I'm not really sure what happened after that because its mostly a blur. I know that went into full OCD cleaning mode thinking that somehow they were attracted to something in the apartment. So did the cleaning work?

Nope....

For the next week I found at least 20 of these things in mi casa! I was getting to the point that I was considering moving. I was totally itchy, sleepless, and miserable beyond measure. I didn't want to eat off of any of my dishes, sleep in my bed, or walk barefooted. I scoured the net and read everything I could on exterminating them.

So yesterday I took the day off: And got all righteous on some cockroach ass!

following the information that I found on the net I "acquired" a pump sprayer and some Cynoff wetable powder to mix up some liquid death, some DeltaDust and a puffer applicator to throw down some powdered death, some glue traps to affect some sticky death upon them, and last but not least, 6 black and decker ultrasonic pest repellers that plug into electrical outlets to scramble some brains!

First I sealed every opening in the walls I possibly could with aerosol polyurethane foam. ( the kind you can find in home depot in the paint isle that cleans up with water- this is important if you don't want a bunch of residue on everything that will never come up.) I pulled the fridge and stove away from the walls and sealed around the electrical outlets. I went under every sink and toilet and made sure that where the drain pipes and water pipes came in through the drywall were well sealed. I did the same for the A/C copper lines and the water heater. I was shocked at the number of open spaces I found!! I think the worst opening i found was in a fluorescent light fixture in my bathroom that had a 1 inch by 30 inch opening that went right into the attic, there's no telling how many critters could have gotten in through that thing.

Next, I put on a respirator and applied the DeltaDust the all the cracks and crevasses I could find. I also blew it through the window, and patio door frames, under the appliances and cabinets. In short, everywhere..... Then I used the sprayer and got all the baseboards, under the sinks, around the toilets, and the exterior door frames.

I plugged the ultrasonic units, cleaned up, and practically collapsed. I had been working for around 6 hours.. I woke up in the middle of the night and looked around the place, almost certain that I was going to find a million bodies...

Guess what I found? Nothing... Not one body. Either the sealing of the holes was the key, or they recognized......

I guess only time will tell. But man, I'd hate to be in the apartment below me, or next to me.

All those nasty things have to go somewhere..

Just sayin' (snap)