Mosquitos

I know they would come. They come every year and you just have to take the right actions to survive. They are the most deadly animals on earth and hated by all but the birds. I am of course talking about the mosquitoes. There are two factors that determines if it is going to be a bad or really bad mosquito year – the temperature and the precipitation. This has been a fairly dry year and it is not particularly hot either so it is, so far, only a bad mosquito year. It is still enough of them to make the birds stuffed after only a few rounds with an open mouth and me crazy after fifteen minutes of cutting the grass. I have, however, bought a new anorak that is made of a soft mosquito net. Perfect if you do not enjoy either constantly beating yourself when trying to kill the small creatures or scratching yourself until you bleed when you have been bitten in the most incredible places. There are a number of different ointments that make you smell like some sort of walking chemistry laboratory but most of them are not particularly effective. In other parts of Sweden I have heard that they use urine on the skin to keep them away. I have not tried that yet. I have, however, used the same strategy as male dogs, rhinos and many other animals do to keep the badger away and, knock wood, it seems to have realized that it is messing with a bear and should be a bit careful. I have not declared victory just yet since I have not seen any white flags and the summer is far from over.

Talking about the small helicopters... a wise man once said that if you think that you are too small to have an impact, you have never spent a night in a tent with a mosquito!