THIS is the Stuff My Nightmares are Made on...

We are such stuff


As dreams are made on; and our little life


Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare

I'm not sure what stuff it is dreams are made on, but I sure can tell you what my nightmares are likely to consist of tonight:

For who knows what reason, we are being INVADED by Gypsy moth caterpillars this year. They are literally all ove the place, by the hundreds. And they are GROSS.

Also called Eastern Tent Caterpillars, because they make tents in trees and destroy the trees. The only way to treat them that I know of is to burn their nests.

 Normally, I'm not a particularly squeamish kinda girl, but these are really freaking me out this year. They hang down on their nearly invisible strings from tree branches, and you don't see them until you've run into them. Or you don't even see one then, but someone tells you you have one crawling up your back.  I have never liked them, because when you squish them, green goop spurts out of them, and it's icky. 

I just ran back up to school to make a photocopy of something for my son that he needed, and they are all over the doors to get into school. I am not exaggerating when I say I bet there were 500 of them on the two double doors I went in. Worst of all is that they either fall to the ground, or congregate there, right along the bottom door edge, like they are TRYING to get into the building. I feel like they are conspiring, to do what evil I'm not really sure, and will turn into big green people eating monsters from some other planet, or something like that, if they actually get INTO school.  Today, the custodians had to take shop vacs out to the playground and vacuum them off the swings, slides, and other playground equipment before the kids could have recess out there. I think they must have dumped the shop vacs in the parking lot, because that was simply swimming with them just now.

My co-workers husband hosed their house down to get rid of them on the vinyl siding the other night. They came back. He did it a second time. They came back. The third time he picked them off by hand (ewwww) and threw them in the fire and burned them up.

I just scraped several off my front door and threw them to the chickens. You know they have to be REALLY nasty when even the chickens won't touch them. So then I stomped them, and twisted my foot around good to get rid of all the green goo.

I already know I'm gonna have nightmares tonight of twisty, squirmy, spiky, gross, nasty caterpillars coming to get me. Maybe I should just stay awake all night. Or something. "Cause I'm sure I won't be "rounded with sleep" as nicely as Shakespeare puts it. At least not while these caterpillars are trying to take over the world. Or at least my little corner of it. ICKKK.