Sunday 15 January 2012

things that go scritch in the night, or I get itchy just thinking about it

I didn't get a lot of co-operation when I suggested ripping the bedclothes off and letting the beds air a bit today, (actually, I got the rudimentary beginning snortings of a snit from one and the total involvement in a video game from the other) so....

so I pulled out the big guns and gave them a science lesson about dust mites. How they live on dead skin. How a protein in their feces (we covered what feces were, too) causes wheezing and runny noses. How about 80% of the dust floating in a sunbeam is bits of dead hair and skin.

And when that wasn't enough, I showed them the weird, headless elephant pictures of microscopic dust mites.
 Viewing those was a fine line between health hazard that you should watch out for and nightmare material that will wake you up screaming in the middle of the night, but I think they're both okay.


The beds were stripped. Windows were opened (briefly, my gosh it was -12C out there!) and dust wiped out of corners. Fresh linens on, we all checked our pillows (I sharpie-marker the date we started using them on the tags) for their sell-by date (2 years) and talked about how fresh air and sunshine was important for everybody, not just growing boys and girls.

It was a nice night.

Now up to a verah long shower and pj's fresh out of the dryer.

Goodnight, all.

5 comments:

Charmedone17 said...

Eek! Not what I should be reading as I lie here in bed ;-) now I feel all itchy!!!!

Anonymous said...

Sleep tight. Don't let the bed bugs bite!

M&Co. said...

You are making me itch just thinking about it.

Pam said...

I'm sure you're right and I won't even think about how old some of our pillows are. We've been married 38 years. Just saying...

The Third Rail said...

I love a good spring cleaning. Too bad I'm the only one brave enough to dedicate an entire weekend to the process!

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