I would happily put up with the mosquitos again for the love of the lightning bugs.

why didn't we ever wear shoes?

So we didn't have to. I know it was a concious decision on my part, when it started to get warm out in the spring, to take off my shoes and socks when I reached the last continuous sidewalk on the route home from school. By the time it got hot I had sufficient callouses on my feet for walking on the blacktop without unbearable pain.

I don't want to live there again, but I do miss Miami sometimes. And often that is at night, because yeah, nights in CA are COLD.

I even had to turn on my heat for an hour or so when I got home.

(Sorry, I feel strongly on this.)

It's just slang. I wouldn't worry about it too much.

Re: bites & stings, I am the sort of person who swells up so badly when bitten that it looks like my skin is about to burst and tiny aliens are about to emerge fully formed and demanding equal representation. In fact, when I was camping in Alaska and had slathered myself in DEET, taking years off my and the planet's life (sorry, planet) I failed to slather my forehead, which was under my bandana (remember when I used to wear that bandana like my stor?).

I ended up looking like a Klingon. Seriously, I was mocked for weeks. It was bad. So I was relieved when the yellowjacket sting didn't actually kill me and just hurt like the dickens.

Not fond of horsefly bites, either.

And of course, the SO had his bout with a spider bite that rendered him helpless with part of his foot swollen the size of a softball and so painful he was crawling down the hallway to get to the bathroom so he could keep his foot elevated.

You're thinking to yourselves, boy am I lucky I don't live in the crazy southwest desert like him, but no, he was bitten while doing treehouse camp in Indiana.

You're thinking to yourselves, boy am I lucky I don't live in the crazy southwest desert like him, but no, he was bitten while doing treehouse camp in Indiana.

I'm mainly thinking, I'm glad I live in Australia. Sure we have the world's most venomous snake, spider (by some measures), jellyfish, invertebrate, creature, octopus, fish and mammal, and stinging ants that can send someone into anaphylactic shock, but we don't have killer bees, dammit, and that counts for something.

Hey, several people have mentioned having some questions about Facebook's levels of privacy and how to set them up - here is a really good overall guide: [link]

I was once stung by a bee on my butt when I was innocently not bothering the bee at all - I was in shorts and pending over to look into a transit level at an archaeological site. This was in Sicily so I blame excessively macho Sicilian bees.

That is a great guide flea. Thanks.

I am back at work. Gronk. My desk looks like some kind of bomb went off on it, but that's what it looks like everyday. I am terribly disorganized for someone who has a library degree and who's job is all about organizing information.

Okay, I'm ignoring all this disturbing animal talk, other than to say that when I was a toddler I was almost literally nibbled to death by ducks. Apparently my toes were too wiggly, and the ducks (or possibly geese) thought they must be a nummy treat.

Anyway, sorry, I apologise for rudely cutting in but I'm having a dementia moment - what's the name of that American woman, the good cookery/housekeeping/interior decor woman who got sent to prison?

what's the name of that American woman, the good cookery/housekeeping/interior decor woman who got sent to prison?

Martha Stewart.

I am terribly disorganized for someone who has a library degree and who's job is all about organizing information.

Sue is me, library degree and all.

THANK you! I can see why the Librarians made you their Warlord!

eta

Now, would I be right in supposing that, notwithstanding having been busted and gone to spend time in The Big House, she is still a loose equivalent, in terms of propriety, of our Delia Smith?

Which is to say - is the notion of Martha Stewart in a bunnygirl outfit something that would make you go OMGWTF?

Fay -- Martha Stewart, for lying about a stock deal. (She'd been a stock broker previously, so she very much knew it was Against the Rules to use insider information to make a killing, which would have been a fine... but then she not only lied about it under oath, she got one of her employees to lie as well. For $35K deal when she's worth millions.)

When I was in Baja, I got stung/bit by one of the local ants, which was very weirdly painful -- I liken it to having the tip of a red hot needle just touched (and held) to your skin. Persistently painful, but not so much you were incapacitated. It faded after an hour or so -- I shouldn't want to have a number of those bites! Just the lone ant that got caught between my sleeve and my arm!