To Kill a Bedding-Bug

Well we know we started this blog to make y'all jealous and to live vicariously through us, but yesterday was not one we'd wish on you!

It all started several weeks ago when Gwenlli was complaining that she had been bitten. I had no such evidence, and so we assumed that they were bites from the newly de-flea-d office. (Side note: G has finished her job and is now working hard on revising for UKCAT which is in a week.)

Two nights ago we were chilling in bed with a book and Gwenlli noticed black spots on the bed sheets. We googled around and realised they are the hallmark of bed-bug faeces. Well, it was midnight, so allow dealing with that now. Let's sleep on it (!) and deal with it in the morning. Of course, neither of us got much sleep in the awareness that we were sleeping on shit. To be technical, bed bugs eat blood and they defecate blood so they're leaving smears of our blood on our sheets. Tasty.

I had some friends over for group project work (model building), but when they left we decided to inspect the bedroom. We lifted the mattresses, inspected the bed frames, and found a live bed bug in Gwenlli's bed. Incidentally it was similar to one I had found in my bed several weeks ago but had been unaware that it was a bed bug and chucked it out the window without further thought. G called Jimmi and explained the situation and apparently it always happens when new people move in. He advised us to bomb the room as that keeps it under control.

Whilst they were on the phone, I lifted the bed frames to take a closer look and saw about ten of them cotching. Luckily my freak-out was the excuse to get off the phone. Hoover at the ready and after practicing several times, I lifted the bed frame and G hoovered them up. That was the start of the hoovering. I went down to Countdown to buy some spray and bombs, came back and cooked some food. In the meantime G was getting the first high-temperature-load on of our clothes. So began the methodical procedure of moving everything out the room (checking it first) and hoovering every square inch.

We found their nest - demarcated by dark black spots all around. We found several more live ones. After hoovering, we strategically aligned the bed frames and mattresses, covered the fire alarm with a rubber glove to prevent it from going off, and started the bomb. The instructions said to wait a minimum of 2 hours. Three and a half hours later G went in to open the windows.

Fandango and Scaramouche having their first bath

In the meantime, Scaramouche, Fandango, and Jermey had their first baths. Fred and Ginger are too old for that so we put them straight in the freezer. After Scaramouche came out we put her in the freezer as we had found a suspicious looking yellow thing in her fur. Bed bugs don't like the cold, but it takes two weeks for them to go from it. During all this, our new flat mates are moving in and M asked "Why do you have bears in the freezer?" He must have thought we were cruel mummies.

Scaramouche in the dryer

Bed bugs can live up to 6 months without a feed so you have to trap them inside the mattress and ensure they slowly starve to death. I tell you, it's quite heart-breaking to think of them in there slowly rotting away but their presence is linked to sleeplessness and allergic reactions. To be honest, they're not really that bad but neither of us want them, and unfortunately it's them or our sleep :(

Scaramouche all fluffy after her adventures

So, G suggested we cling-film the bed frames and the mattresses which took about half an hour. After that, we started to move everything back in. I wanted to take the rubber glove off the fire alarm and was wary of bringing any wooden furniture into the bedroom (all of ours was bombed), so elected to use what felt like a sturdy shelving unit. Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was deceptive and I fell straight through, breaking the shelves in the process. Cuts and scrapes are up my leg but luckily not that hurt.

We also forgot to wash our duvets so slept under clean duvet cases. So, safely tucked in we're just about to go to sleep when this noise started. I barely had enough time to ask "What was that?" when the mirror fell off the wall and shattered into a thousand pieces.

So begins our seven years of bad luck.

Return of the Teddy

We've been nagged and begged, implored and demanded, to update the poor folk living vicariously through our New Zealand experience. To that end, we're back with an update!

The most important, biggest, news is that we are delighted to announce the addition of a new member of our family. She was delivered by stork last month, the sister of Fandango, she is of course Scaramouche. She is the second Welsh sheep of our small clan. This was her first photo shoot, so she was rather shy.

Since our last post, we *finally* *finally* moved into our new flat! It's lovely and spacious, and we had a really nice flatmate who spent most of her time out of the flat. She has now moved out, and we're in an interim period awaiting another couple to move in in a few weeks time. We had our choice of people, but they were the most accommodating to our vegetarian needs. Although we only met one half of the couple, he was keen to cook with us occasionally and to also store any meat in a fridge in their own room. Everyone else who came to see the flat responded to the question of food with "Oh, that's a shame. I LOVE meat".

C: So, Gwenllian, what have you been up to since we last posted?
G: Well, I've been working hard at ballet and have been doing point again. I'm about to finish working at Inland Revenue and start a month's revision period before going to Australia to do the GAMSAT. That's a 6-hour exam which will test my knowledge of science, maths, and verbal reasoning that universities at home will use to ascertain whether or not to let me be a doctor.

C: That sounds like quite a slog!
G: Yeah, that's why I'm taking the month off. Luckily my contract is ending and I have another job to see me through.

C: Oh yeah?
G: Yeah :) I'm working for a psychology professor at the University of Auckland as a research assistant. We're replicating a study done in America to determine how the parents of eating disorder patients can benefit from online resources. I'm spending most of my time at the moment writing funding applications, and finding out statistics such as how many Maori people we think will be involved. I'm really enjoying it.

G: But you got to be involved too!
C: Oh yeah :) Last weekend I entertained the daughter of the professor whilst you and she were in the living room doing adult stuff. We just watched science cartoons and played Rummikub!

G: That sounds like what we did with your parents...
C: Somehow I always end up playing Rummikub :) Mum and Don came to visit and they took us to the Bay of Islands for a four-day weekend trip to a gorgeous guest house. We will likely write up that trip in a separate post, but suffice to say it was really lovely to see people from the hood.

G: How about university? 
C: !Brag Alert! I received my grades from last semester and got straight As all around! I've just started Semester Two and have already been working quite a bit. One of my courses this semester is writing a computer model with two other people. We have decided to model desertification in a semi-arid region in response to grazing pressures. It's been a really fun project so far, and it's been great to get back into coding. Speaking of coding, I've also had a job on the side with a web company thanks to a friend from silks. It's only PHP but it's been nice to be back in the company of computer geeks. Plus, Curry Wednesday last week was brilliant (free yummy curry on a Wednesday if in the office)!

Well, that's a brief summary of the last few months. We will write up more this weekend.