La cucaracha...

So yesterday, I made a huge pot of spaghetti, so I can have lots of leftovers this week. It's not that I'm saving time, but I'm trying to starve out the cockroaches, and making one big meal all at once (and then packaging it tightly and storing it in the refrigerator), means that I can use fewer pans, etc. during the busy part of the week. This means I'm less likely to leave any drips or crumbs for the nasty little pests.

I've seen five of them now. Three in the bathtub, one in the drain of the kitchen sink, and one on the bathroom floor. I seem to have inherited a thriving colony of all the various breeds from the prior tenant. Sigh. It's not that I'm not a generally clean person in the kitchen, it's just that I hate having to do the dishes IMMEDIATELY, EVERY TIME. It's tedious to not be able to leave your afternoon tea mug in the sink until dinnertime. It's also tedious to have to think so hard about how you store all your food. Roaches love paper and cardboard and glue---hence, I'm working to eliminate those from cabinets. What a pain, since lots of dry goods come packaged in boxes. And, of course, it's tedious to have to dry everything right away, including the dishes, the sink, the bathtub, the bathroom sink. Roaches need to get water every single day, so one of the best ways to get rid of them is to remove all possible water sources.

I'm hoping that when it gets cold, the roaches will decide to move into the neighbors' houses, which will almost certainly be much warmer than mine. (This is hope in the true sense of the word---I don't think this is really going to happen),

The next step is moving to active measures (like boric acid, aka Borax, or the combination of baking soda and powdered sugar that blows them up when they eat it---fun!). If they are coming in through the drains, I can keep them out mechanically, with plugs. But if they are coming in through the walls or floors (more likely, frankly), then I will have to step things up.

I had a lizard in the living room. But that didn't bother me. I tried to catch him to look at him more closely, but he ran out the door before I could get 'im.

A flock of quail live in the field next door, and I've seen two roadrunners! I also saw an enormous (maybe 4 feet long) green snake in the middle of the road. It was very dead. There's some crazy bird that makes the most astonishing noises just after the sun goes down, but I haven't seen it yet, so I don't know what it is!