Meg's Diary

Bugs, Banging, and Book Divas

Remember how I told you a previous owner of the house we just moved into died in the kitchen?

Well, we're having the kitchen ripped out right now (not because of Mary's ghost, which I still haven't seen, by the way. Also the guy who told me about her? Yeah, he went to the Key West jail for beating someone up, so I'm thinking, Maybe not a reliable narrator). But whatever.

We're having the kitchen ripped out and remodeled because my husband just graduated from the French Culinary Institute (a dream of his was to go to cooking school***much like a certain character in a certain book of mine coming out TOMORROW***so since he supported me when I was first starting out writing, I was all, “It's my turn to support you now,” so he quit his job and went to cooking school) and now he's building his dream kitchen.

I don't really know much about it, because I don't care about kitchens. But I know there's something involving foot pedals that turn the water on and off so that if your hands are all chickeny, you don't have to touch the faucet handles and get them all salmonella-y. And other fancy stuff.

All I know is whatever it is they're doing down there seems to involve picking up sledgehammers and ramming them into the wall directly beneath my bed at seven in the morning.

I am not kidding.

And I seriously don't mean to complain. I know I'm lucky to have a house to remodel. I mean, there are tons of people who don't own a house, much less afford to remodel the one they do have. Like people in Bangladesh, whose houses all just got washed away by those floods.

But I don't feel so lucky every morning at seven AM, when I am jolted out of bed by what feels like a hammer to my brain.

And the banging continues nonstop until 3PM EVERY WEEK DAY.

It's not like I go to work every day. I mean, I do, but I go to work IN MY HOUSE. WITH THE BANGING GOING ON IN THE BACKGROUND.

Also my entire house is covered in dust. Purple Heat, my bike? I am calling her Dusty now. Not to mention, we have no kitchen. Which means…yeah. No kitchen. I put this mini fridge in my bedroom, and it is fully stocked with life-sustaining Tab. It's like my college dorm room. The rest of the time, we have to eat out.

Which you so feel like doing at 7AM.

Everywhere else you go in the house, everything is wrapped in plastic, like Elliott's house in the last few scenes of ET. If you want to go from one room to another, you have to push huge sheets of plastic out of the way to get there.

Guess who loves to eat plastic?

Yeah, that would be my one-eyed cat Henrietta.

So she is banished to the bedroom, where she has to stay twenty-four seven, to keep her from chewing on the plastic. Also to keep her from slipping through one of the GIANT HOLES in my kitchen floor, which lead directly to…dirt.

Of course I couldn't let my husband have all the demolition fun, so I asked for a new bathroom suite. They are ripping apart my old bathroom right now. This involves even more banging, even closer to my bedroom. Henrietta is currently cowering under the bed. They are taking out my old bathtub in pieces.

Ultimately I know all of this will result in the house of my dreams.

But right now I am finding it kind of hard to believe. That is on account of the ants I just found.

IN MY BED.

I don't know how ants got in my bed. My husband said it's because I like to eat smoked almonds in bed. But I don't think this is so. When you eat a smoked almond, there are no crumbs. You put the whole thing in your mouth. So this is an unfair accusation.

Every day I find new bugs crawling in unlikely places. Like on my computer screen, or out of the drain in the shower. What I do is, I capture the bug, then I go show it to Frank, one of the construction guys. He tells me what kind of bug it is, then I find the appropriate pesticide, and I spray the area with it.

Because, while I am all for environmental friendliness, I DO NOT WANT BUGS IN MY BED.

It is bad enough I am just getting over lyme disease. I don't want something WORSE, like West Nile.

And okay, I know ants don't cause West Nile.

BUT WHAT IF THEY CRAWL IN MY HAIR???

Or in my ear, like Claire Danes' friend in that horrible movie where they were locked in a Thai prison, or whatever it was.

Well, it turns out the GIANT HOLES IN MY KITCHEN FLOOR are letting in tons of bugs, AND other creatures, to the delight of Henrietta, who hears them scratching in the walls and goes MENTAL trying to claw through the plaster to get at them.

At first I thought it was bats. Now I'm pretty sure it's rats.

According to Frank, they're friendly rats, though. They leap around on the branches in the tree outside, like squirrels.

You know things have gotten pretty bad when you have rats in the house and you don't even care.

This is because I know Henrietta will catch a rat. She will never catch an ant, though, because they're too small, and she can't see them with her one eye.

Anyway, I just wanted to alert you al to the conditions I am currently living in, and how because of it, I am actually reversing my previous stance on my upcoming book tour: I AM THRILLED TO BE GOING. Even though it will take me away from the book I'm currently working on, it will also take me away from the BUGS AND BANGING.

And for that I am forever thankful.

Although I will totally miss Henrietta. She will have Frank and the rest of the guys (not to mention Mary) to keep her company though.

So see you all (hopefully) in Indiana at the end of the week (for exact locations/dates of signings, see Tour section of this website). For those of you who can't make it to any of my signings, visit me at www.megcabotbookclub.com or at BookDivas, the fabulous website devoted to all things books, where I'll be stopping by regularly to post! Click on the link below to stop by!

More later.

Much love,

Meg

PS My neighbor (not the one in jail) just took up the drums. I AM NOT KIDDING.

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