out of control mosquitoes.

Micro-bots  got nothing on these 'quitos.

Let me tell you about the insane mosquito invasion of Houston last week. After a particularly warm few days, it suddenly became impossible to walk through grassy areas without suffering (mosquito) battle wounds. In class, it became a common sight to see students scratch themselves, even professors giving into the itch. Performing meticulous tasks became a teed bit harder as we fought the overwhelming need growing on the inside of our arm while sorting through wires, lifting heavy ramps, pipetting exact volumes of solvent.

I did some mini-research to figure out the 5 W's + How. After the much-needed rainstorm on the 9th plus the 10-14 days eggs take to hatch, the mosquito invasion of Houston began on October 20th, 2011. Stores ran out of mosquito repellants, my neighborhood brought back the spraying trucks, people reported swarm sightings on facebook and twitter.

This morning I woke up to surprisingly cold weather. The water from my faucet felt cold and when I pushed the already-cold knob, the outside air was surprisingly crisp and cool: hello, 40's weather!

I was so occupied by the freezing weather (and a dog attacking me in the intramural fields) that I failed to notice the lack of new bites on my usual walk across the grass. It was only while parting with a friend after lunch we noticed that we had been outside for an hour and had no bites to show for it.

How did I fail to notice that the mosquitoes were gone precisely because of the cold I'd been whining about? It's like the "I Hope You Dance" song: "Whenever one door closes, I hope one more opens"(sorta? work with me here). So au revoir, mosquitoes.