Attack of the Black Fuzzy Caterpillars

ATTACK OF THE BLACK FUZZY CATERPILLARS

…AND OTHER STUFF

         

The prediction for early spring has been made, but I do not require a groundhog to tell me this.  I live in Southern California and the seasons here are pretty much indistinguishable.  Winters are mild and summers average.  The only way we can tell the changing of seasons is to hear the laments of friends and family in far away places.   This year is particularly harsh for friends in the Midwest, South and well, anywhere east of the Rockies.  I feel for them and keep them in my prayers.

While they all freeze in the blizzards of winter and cheer the predictions of Phil, I have my own indicators of early spring; the black fuzzy caterpillars.  Our yard is a carpet of creepy crawly moth larvae.  I am told these creatures with brown stripes are moths; the big white kind that attach to walls in the day and flit about lights at night. 

It is difficult to ignore them.  They are everywhere; inside and out.  I first thought the indoor invasion was the few escapees from my son’s bug cage.  I was wrong.  It didn’t take long to realize the dozens attached to our living room curtains had found their own way in; through the breezy cracks of our sliding glass doors. Weather proofing doors and windows are low on the priority list of needed repairs.  Instead each repair moment is focused on other projects.  It seems silly.  Weather stripping is cheap and easy but I’d rather focus on the doors, cabinets and furniture that are so subject to slamming, kicking and throwing by crazed children. 

I enjoy working on house projects, provided I don’t have too much “help.”  The constant chorus of “can I hammer something? Can I saw it?” will turn an hour long door frame-up into an all day ordeal. Well, that and the fact that although I enjoy working with tools, I am not that good at fix-it projects.  So, while the new door hangs crookedly in the frame and awaits renewed efforts to fix it, the new black fuzzy carpet will continue to slowly creep across the lawn and into the house.  The cat will continue to bat the caterpillars into oblivion, the kids will marvel at the cocoons and I will wave a magic wand at the door and tilt the house the opposite angle to give the appearance of level.