Thursday 26 June 2014

900 times bitten, and still very shy


We have been back on the boat since Sunday afternoon, after an early-ish start from Scotland. Our leave taking was marred by my being viciously attacked by a HUGE ravenous swarming horde of midges. There were so many of them it was almost impossible to see the car which they had ambushed in the sure and certain knowledge that I, dressed in T-shirt and shorts, would be coming out to complete the packing. I am not clear how they knew that David isn’t the one with 3D puzzle knowledge for fitting in far more than we arrived with, or how they knew he would be wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. After being soundly, roundly and profoundly bitten, I covered myself in most of what remained of Marta’s tube of Anthisan and off we went with the car full of the little b*stard biters. Tim had told us that they do not attack if the wind is going more than 4mph, so we drove off with the windows open to suck them out of our space. Those that clung to the cloth on the window frames were viciously crushed where they crouched. And did I mourn their passing? Not on your life!

Since then I look like I’ve got chicken pox – bites up and down my legs and arms, on my neck and face. On Monday I had to resort to getting antihistamine tablets so I’d get some relief and be able to sleep. Things are improving, dear reader, and now all I have are slightly itchy, but very red HUGE mountains on the aforesaid legs, arms, neck and face.

So away with feminism, I say – let the man pack the car! And make sure he is dressed appropriately in shorts and T-shirt…


PS Forget to say that when we were driving the boys to the dinosaur park on Saturday I saw a red squirrel running across the road near Corsock! Lovely, and so much smaller than the grey squirrels that are everywhere in London’s parks.

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