Dive Bomb

Today

The other night I made the mistake of turning on the bedroom light without first of all shutting the curtains. In a very short space of time the room was filled with flying things. They batted about the room and all looked very nasty.

There are some insects which just have to die. Wasps, crane flies, bluebottles and, of course, mosquitoes. Reluctant to have our newly painted walls stippled with squashed corpses, we sprayed the room liberally with toxins. This gave us an insect-free night, although we did have to check the bed for dead bodies first.

In My Day

The bedroom I slept in as a child was in the basement and had a window, half subterranean, that looked into the area. There was no easy access to this space and it quickly became clogged with dead leaves, paper and other slimy rubbish. From time to time Daddy would clamber in and sweep up and cover everything else with Jeyes Fluid. I can remember that horrible carbolic smell.

In the Summer, opening my window after dark was a foolish action as the mosquitoes that bred in the usually full drain would visit me to feast on my young blood. In the dark they would whine like approaching dive bombers. Signal to put my light on and start the search and destroy mission.

This didn't stop my being bitten and having a nasty allergic reaction to their bites.

When I complained to my parents they had two solutions. One was to pour paraffin into the drain itself. This, according to Daddy, would stop the creatures from breeding as the larvae couldn't stick their little probosces into the air through the slippery paraffin. The other was dose my bedroom, using the "Flit Spray". This contained DDT which, as we now know, is more toxic than anything contained in a can of "Raid".

What I want to know is, why do mosquitoes just bite some people and not others? And why me?