A word about ants

There is nothing that comes close to my hate of cockroaches, except for maybe ants.  I really hate them.  Besides the obvious, I think it stems from several things:

1) They travel in a sizeable pack.  What do I consider a sizeable pack?  More than 3.  Much like cockroaches, you know there's never just one.  They have back up.  And how.  I don't understand that in the great expanse of my back yard, they can't find one thing to eat.  My kids are out there all the time, so I know there are sizeable crumbs dropped on a very regular basis.  Enough to feed my own adult family for a day, if they were pattied together.  So, what's the deal?
2) They are quick little bandits.  I've been known to contort myself into unknown and never before seen positions, trying to locate a single ant who has found it's way onto me, and is running scared.  One minute it's on my hand, and then next it's up near my neck.  The ant's here are small.  You might feel a little something and by the time you've figured out it's an ant, you already have a welt that's on FIRE!!  The feeling of fire suddenly alerts your body that there are other fire's elsewhere.  You look down and sure enough, they're all over in your shoes.  Which brings me to #3....
3) When I was four, I was out in my Grandpa's garden. I was amusing myself by poking a stick down what seemed to be an out of place mound of some sort.  I would smash the little hill with the stick and bugs came pouring out.  Wow.  Cause and effect.  Smash, smash, smash.....ants EVERYWHERE!!  I became almost hypnotized by their frantic activity, and didn't realize these red ants were now all over me.....until they began exacting their revenge and nibbling on my poor little 4 yr old legs.  I froze....then screamed bloody murder, which alerted my mother, who was in the kitchen.  She came running to my rescue and had to physically pick me up out of the ants and strip me down to my wonder woman underpants, after several failed attempts at getting me to step out of the pile myself.  It was all very ironic (with the wonder women underwear and all), embarrasing, and traumitizing.

They might be one of the strongest living things on this earth, but aren't the brightest of species.  For example:  When a massacre has taken place.  The ants apparently do not retreat and return to report that their mission ended in overwhelming casualty.  They come back again and again.  AND again!!!  I spent the majority of this morning cleaning up a tirade.  Not one ant first thing this morning, but I came back down at 9, and they are pouring out of my dishwasher and from under my sink.  Eww.  I've completely lost my appetite.  For a better visual of what happens when we find ants, please watch the re-enactment below starring MacGuyver.  He wasn't cheap :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikTsqGE0hzg