This Syria thing? It's gnat worth worrying about

Today's topic here at The Man Rules is the worsening situation with Syria and the fear that the U.S. may launch military strikes against them, but first we need to talk about the growing gnat problem.

I don't know what bugs are like where you live, but here in Alabama we're quickly becoming Gnat Central. It used to be mosquitoes that were the worst summertime pests, followed closely by Amway salesmen, but I guess vigorous eradication efforts by local governments have culled the numbers of both those bugs.

Do you remember the old Off! commercials? Off! was a bug-repellant spray that worked amazingly well because it had illegal chemicals in it, like DDT and cyanide. The TV commercial would show a plastic box with a small rubber opening at one end. The box was swarming with mosquitoes, and while the announcer talked about how pesky those mosquitoes could be, somebody would insert their hand and forearm into the box through the rubber opening. Instantly the mosquitoes covered the hand and forearm like a grayish-black glove, sucking every last bit of blood out of it. (I don't know who this volunteer hand donor was, but I hope they got paid a hundred jillion dollars.)

Then the announcer said "Now watch the difference as we spray the hand with Off!" Sure enough, on TV the hand was being sprayed down and then reinserted into the box. This time the mosquitoes ignored the hand. The announcer extolled the virtues of Off!, apparently ignoring the fact that a) the hand was now almost skeletal from lack of blood, and b) the mosquitoes were completely full from their meal a few moments ago, and weren't interested in eating any more.

This isn't exactly how the commercial looked, but it'll give you the approximate idea.

So thanks to Off! and the volunteer hand, mosquitoes aren't as big of a problem any more, which apparently has made room for roving bands of gnats to threaten our summer days.

I used to be somewhat tickled by gnats. When I was younger, I can remember seeing little swarms of them, maybe 100 or so, somehow circling the same point in space over and over and over, never coming in to land, just like commercial airliners at the Atlanta airport. Sometimes I'd take a wet cloth or something and twirl it through the swarm, laughing as only a carefree and sadistic 12-year-old can.

Well. Apparently I royally ticked off the Gnat Rulers by my actions, because now, 35 years later, they have come back to haunt me. In spades.

I was sitting in the swing one evening over the weekend, watching the boys jump on the trampoline. It was an idyllic scene -- the gentle creak of the swing chains, a slight breeze rustling the jasmine vine, the boys arguing bitterly over who was or was not touched by the Zombie Death Ball as they bounced around. (Apparently being touched by the Zombie Death Ball is a Very Bad Thing when you're on our trampoline.)

Suddenly, without warning, gnats started whining in my ear and flying around my head. (I say "without warning," although come to think of it, what sort of warning should I expect gnats to give? "Look out! We're dive-bombing gnats and we're out to get you!") What's worse, our gnats are inordinately attracted to eyeballs. I don't know why this is, but gnats apparently love nothing better than to splat themselves right into the corner of your eye. Maybe, to gnats, the human eye is a major sex object, and getting to land in it is like scoring a date with Jessica Alba -- or, if you're a female gnat, Hugh Jackman.

Anyway, I sat in the swing for a few more minutes, waving my hands and arms around my head in a futile attempt to keep the gnats away. All this does, though, is give the gnats a homing point to focus on. It would be like Jessica Alba sending out messages on her Twitter account saying "It's 6:02 p.m., and I'm sitting at the third table from the door in Tavern on the Green. Paparazzi stay away!"

Eventually I got so frustrated that I told the boys it was time to go inside ("But DAAAAaaad! We haven't even gotten to kick the Zombie Death Ball yet!") and get their showers. While they were whining their way inside, I got the garden hose, turned the nozzle to Jet Blast, and sprayed water directly into my eyeballs in an attempt to wash away all the gnats that had collected in the corners of my eyes. It was not an idyllic end to the evening.

So I definitely think somebody, maybe President Obama, needs to do something about these gnats. And while he's at it, fix this Syria situation too. I've done all I can.

(c) 2013 John Puckett