Cleaning for New Energy

For today's cleaning project, I dealt with a massive ant attack in the kitchen. It was the most ants I have ever seen in a house, probably at least 5000 in huge streams coming from under the couch, circling the guinea pig cage and attacking the trash, the fruit bowl, and the counter tops. Thank Goodness, they weren't actually into the cupboards and most of the food.

The ants and we live in an uneasy situation all summer long. I dislike using poisons, so when they get active we usually try to address their forays by keeping everything super clean and by spraying them with vinegar or Windex and wiping away the scouts. But this summer has been the worst one yet. They are randomly in our kitchen daily, but also other odd places -- the bathrooms in the tub and the counters, along the floors, in the bedrooms here and there. I have even had ants on my desk and my computer and I never, ever  have food here!

I've been saying for a while now that as soon as everybody gets back to school and out of the house for some hours, I am going to resort to actual poison. So the ants made a HUGE strategic error by massing their forces today, the first day when everyone had to be at school at an early time, and the first day that I am alone here for hours.

I have sprayed and wiped and swept and now there are about 5000 dead ants, and my surfaces are clean. I am not playing around any more here, ants! If you continue to treat my house like a safe zone, I will employ all methods of removal at my disposal!
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While I was doing all that cleaning, I cleaned out the guinea pig cage too. They actually live very happily in a small plastic wading pool, with the fence around them just to make sure the dogs don't bother them. I tried it out for a few days when we first set it up, and just as I suspected, although they are perfectly capable of jumping the edges of the pool, they didn't. I've never seen animals so happy to be in their cage. They get really happy when you clean it out too. They like to see how things have moved and changed, and they love their fresh hay and snacks.