First of all, I’d just like to say to my office mates: I am
so, so sorry.
*ahem* (That was me, clearing my throat as I steel myself to
tell this story. It’s so bad that I don’t know if I should put it on the
interwebs. My strong need to self-deprecate, however, has won the day.)
We’ve had a bit of a fruit fly problem in our office suite
at work these past few months. It’s arguably been the worst back in my
office—or at least, I was the one bitching the most about it. On any given day
there were at least one or two of the little buggers flying in my face, or
worse, in my clients’ faces. It’s been not only annoying, but downright
embarrassing, to have to apologize to my clients about this. “Oh, I’m so
sorry…I’m apparently a filthy person. My bad.”
I’ve been on an investigative mission to find the source of
these effing pests. Let’s call it Operation: Find the Funk. Granted, it’s been
slow going. Probably because this operation mostly involves me sitting in my
chair, scratching my head, and wondering what’s going on, more than me actually
doing anything. Also, complaining to my office mate Megan is an important part
of this operation.
A couple of times, I’ve gotten up to check some places. My
initial suspicions centered on my purse. Let me tell you about me and purses: I choose
to carry one big enough to hold all of these items on any given workday: my
big fat wallet, a water bottle, a bag of toiletries, my phone, my Nook, my
writing notebook, some files, my laptop and the charger, my lunch, and then
whatever other random stuff I need to be carrying around that day. Sometimes an
extra pair of shoes goes in there. Also, another small bag (for shopping
trips) must be able to fit within the larger purse-- because who could lug that big one into a
store, if they needed to shop?
As you’ve probably figured out, the handbags I choose are
voluminous and accommodating—too accommodating, really, because I have no
respect for them. I’m downright abusive. They get all banged up,
slammed around. Small items, once placed in them, are gone forever—my purse is the
Bermuda Triangle of children’s toys. And food gets spilled in pretty much every bag I've ever owned. One time I somehow
dropped an entire buffalo chicken wing into a purse, and rather than getting
mad I was all like “yep, that seems about right.”
That being said, having the thought that perhaps I had put a
banana or an apple in my purse and forgotten about it indefinitely, hence
generating lots of fruit flies, was completely legitimate. (Portable fruit
flies! Bonus!) Note: I have done this
many times before. Purses have been tossed straight into the trash due to
finding black sludge at the bottom of it that was once a banana.
But I checked my purse, and I checked it again and again: no
decayed fruit. I even bought a new purse,
thinking maybe there were fruit remnants from some past forgotten fruit
incident in the old one--- like maybe old stank fruit juice was soaked into the liner or something and the fruit flies were living there. But no—even
with the new, huge handbag in tow, the fruit flies in my office persisted.
I checked under the couch, my chair, and under my bookcases,
just in case an apple or orange had gone rogue and rolled under there. Nope. I
take the trash out regularly, so I knew the trash wasn’t the culprit.
Eventually I just gave up and accepted my fate as Our Lady
of Flies—like a patron saint for household pests. I figured there was a rotting
piece of fruit somewhere else in the office suite that none of us had noticed
yet.
And then today happened.
Today I opened my food drawer. Yeah, I’ve got an entire
drawer in my office dedicated to random food. It’s mostly chocolate, but also a
couple of packages of Ramen (for super emergency “I forgot my lunch” days), an
almost-finished bag of Cheetos, gum, other random stuff I’ve acquired as gifts,
including a big bottle of Fireball (also only for super emergencies, mostly)…and
one, super old, long-forgotten about cup of applesauce. I’ve literally had that
cup of applesauce since internship, because I remember bringing it from my old
office at Creighton to my current office.
In 2012. Whoops.
You might see where this is going.
Somehow…at some point…the foil cover of the applesauce was
punctured. Guess what happened?
Spoiler alert: Fruit flies happened.
I have no idea when this started or how long it has been
going on. (cue intense shame)
Oh my gosh, you guys…it was so gross. Have you ever seen the
little cocoon shells that fruit flies hatch out of? Neither had I, until today.
And boy, did I see them, all transparent and crusty, covering at least a third of the area of the applesauce lid. Cocoon on top of cocoon on top of cocoon. A pile of used tiny worm incubators. *shudder*
I was possibly more bothered by this than the average bear
would be. Ask my mom: I have indoor worm issues. Outdoor worms: whatever, do
your thing, you are good for fishing and keeping my soil fertile, so thanks.
But as for you indoor worms: you have no place in my life. In high school, I
went on a cleaning rampage in our family’s entire kitchen on several different
occasions, each time tossing almost all of the dry goods, because of a weevil
infestation. (Or at least what I perceived to be an infestation.) I HATE indoor
worms. I have a VENDETTA against indoor worms. There is nothing about a worm
that belongs indoors.
So you can imagine my horror at realizing that I had
been the cause of Indoor Wormageddon/ Fruit Fly Hell.
At least I know how to handle this shit. My high school
anti-worm agenda prepared me well.
Out went the applesauce. Out went all the food. Anything
that was not less than a week old: out, out, out.
In came the dustbuster. I sucked up the leftover worm cocoon
casings. And then, because I had a couple of last-minute cancellations today, I
spent the rest of the afternoon zapping the fruit flies up in the dustbuster
while writing assessment reports. It was kind of fun. I felt like a superhero. They
call me Dr. Dustbuster—Warrior Psychologist.
So, Operation Find the Funk draws to an end. My dignity dies
with it. (That’s so not true, by the
way. I ran plum out of dignity a long, long time ago. Reference my previous
posts on chasing mice while naked and sucking laundry detergent out of a straw,
if you have questions as to the whereabouts of my dignity.)
Now that the story is out, I would be remiss to not offer one
more sincere apology to my office mates, the distinguished Drs. Prendes-Lintel,
Watson, Furr, and Davis. You guys, I’m sorry that I accidentally made our
office gross. Also, let’s not tell the landlord.
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