stink, stank, stunk

most of you have probably read amalah's account of her stinkbug infestation, right? so, i live in the same basic region as amy, and have been dealing with a similar, uh, situation of my own. e.g., the "how many stinkbugs will i find in my house TODAY?" situation.

(answer: typically anywhere between 2 and 10.)

reading amy's post provided a VERY HELPFUL tidbit of information, though: that squishing those big, ugly, armored weirdo bugs not only smells terrible, but TELLS OTHER STINKBUGS TO COME ON OVER. what the eff, stinkbugs? that is a seriously terrible evolutionary flaw you've developed. "hey! smells like johnny just got offed - let's all go to the exact spot where it just happened and hang out!"

ANYWAY. as a result of this thrilling information, i've been vaccuuming up the fuckers instead of squishing them, because i already have PLENTY crawling around without sending out a freaking stink bug bat signal to attract more. one hiccup with this plan, though, is that i own cats. and cats are notoriously bad at a) doing what you want them to do, and b) using vaccuum cleaners. so this means that when the cats find a stink bug before i do, they.. well... they play with it. half the time this results in a dead (stinky) stink bug, and half the time this ends up with a terrorized (and still stinky) stink bug hiding out in a place the cats can't find it.

so the other night, i'm in bed reading. i decide i'm nice and sleepy, so i put down the book, turn off the light, and snuggle into my covers, snaking one arm under my pillow like always. and my fingers touch something... crunchy. my first thought is that it's a tag from the throw pillow. my second thought is that i think i remember the cats chasing a stink bug behind my bed earlier in the day. my third thought is that i'm awfully tired, and stink bugs don't really DO anything anyway, and it's probably the pillow tag anyway, so do i really care? it's probably not a stink bug.

my fourth thought: OMG WHAT IF I WAKE UP WITH A STINK BUG CRAWLING ALL OVER MY FACE? I CARE! GAH, I CARE!

so i turned on my light and lift up my pillow... and yup. a fucking stink bug, waving its creepy feelers and wandering around under my head. GRAAAARRGGH. i grabbed a tissue and tossed him in the toilet and went back to bed.

...and noticed that my hand REEKED of stink bug stank. apparently the fuckers are like skunks, and can DOUSE you with stink when startled. or, uh, poked. i don't know exactly, but i can tell you that it doesn't wash off. my hand AND my BED smelled like stink bug, and unless i wanted to get up at 1am to do a load of laundry, there didn't appear to be anything i could do about it.

i cannot wait for it to get cold enough to kill these guys.