Those of you who are faithful blog followers will know that I have had several harrowing experiences with bugs to date. Such as the time a cockroach FLEW on my pillow. yeah. And the other time when I bought a magical tennis racket of doom that had powers to kill mosquitoes. If you're not a faithful follower of my blog, well, you know, whatever.
Anyway, the problem with the tennis racket of doom is that it is retaliatory, not preventative, in nature. The way you are alerted to a mosquitoes' presence is when it bites you. That's when you know it's time to kill it. But it doesn't change the fact that your leg now itches. And that there are probably mosquito friends lurking somewhere in the shadows, waiting.
This morning, at 3am, I received alerts that there was a mosquito I needed to kill. Twice. Once on the eyebrow and once on the lip.
Have you ever heard the story of the rookie soldier and the war veteran? And the rookie soldier is complaining about how he broke his fingernail. And then the war veteran is like "you wuss" and he breaks the rookie soldier's pinkie finger. And the rookie soldier says, "owwwww, why?" And the war veteran says, "well now your fingernail doesn't hurt, right?" Let's just say the mosquito bite on the lip FAR overshadows the mosquito bite on the eyebrow. I've forgotten I even have a mosquito bite on my eyebrow.
As I was saying, I woke up at 3 in the morning thinking "owwww, why?" and then looked in the mirror. And realized. There was a mosquito that definitely needed to be killed. Because not only do mosquito bites on the lip feel more painful than itchy, they also make you look pretty darn foolish:
That mosquito is dead now. Thanks, tennis racket of doom.
Side note: when I was getting ready to come to Taiwan, the Americans told me I should get vaccinated for Japanese Encephalitis, this unpleasant brain swelling virus carried by mosquitoes. And I was like "ok, if you say so" and started the three shot procedure. I needed to finish the last of the three shots when I went to Germany. So I went to this German doctor who told me "you silly American that's totally unnecessary and dumb." So I said "ok, if you say so." I think of that doctor sometimes. Particularly when I get mosquito bites. On my LIP (and eyebrow). Kind of close to my, as yet, unswollen brain.
