The ants go marching...

Mikey has "ant-bite disease." He is convinced of it, and you shouldn't come near him because you might catch it. Should you catch "ant-bite disease" from Mikey you will instantly become ant-fodder. They will be able to sniff you out from miles away and they will swarm to your ankles, nibbling their way up your legs. Poor kid has had more ant bites than the rest of us combined.

Apparently I got too close to Mikey, I think I have the disease. Until yesterday I had only been bitten by little bitty northern ants, and they aren't really that mean. As a matter of fact you have to provoke those northern ants to make them bite you, which I did by throwing burning garbage into their ant hill. (I was in like 5th grade or something...nobody ever accused me of being a smart child.) But these southern ants, even the little black ones, are really flesh-eating little monsters! I got three ant bites yesterday, two on my foot and one on my ankle.

Now keep the ant bites in mind as I tell you the rest of my story. These events will seem unrelated, and maybe they are, but it is almost four o'clock in the morning and I can't sleep, so everything seems related at this point!

Michael took me on a hot date tonight. We went and ate at a local seafood joint where I had two big Dr. Peppers to drink. Then we went to see Night at the Museum 2, where we split another gigantic Dr. Pepper. If you know me well, you know that my max is one soda a day, or I am up ALL NIGHT LONG...literally. So we came home, got the kids in bed and went to bed ourselves. I was trying really hard to fall asleep, and dozed off a few times. Ella is getting teeth and is very restless tonight, so that didn't help.

Then my foot, the one where the ants ate my flesh, started itching. Not just regular itching, burning itching. I tried to ignore it. I tried to rub it a little. I wasn't going to cave and start scratching. I tried to think of other things, I caved, I started scratching. Then the burning got worse. I thought to myself how ridiculous it was to lay there scratching, why not just go rub some benadryl on it. I got up, went to the medicine cabinet...no benadryl. But wait...there is some orajel...would that work? Well it was worth a try, right? At 3 am anything seems logical...so I rubbed the orajel on my foot, and on my ankle. Then I thought, these aren't just any little bitty ant bites, these are flesh eating ants, and they sting really bad...I better use some more, so I used more, a lot more. Feeling like I had really done some good, I laid back down in bed. The stinging didn't stop...give it time, wait for it, wait for it...still no relief. I decided to get out of bed and work on my tooth unit for the Homeschool Share Contest. When I stood up, a funny thing happened, I COULDN'T FEEL MY FOOT! Except for the stinging part. To top it off, as I sit here, I have been biting my nails, and now my lips are numb...I forgot to wash my hands after putting the orajel on my foot.

So here I sit at 4AM with a stinging club foot, numb lips and NO SLEEP, thanks to the flesh-eating ants and my Dr. Pepper binge this evening...