Be glad there are no pictures

People joke about being flighty, or absent-minded, or whatever. I don't tend to. If I forget things, it's because I'm well and truly overwhelmed with responsibilities, or something.

Which brings me to the fruit flies.

For the past. . .month, maybe? I'd get in my van, say a little prayer of thanks for it (I still love it very much) and set off on my way. Then I'd notice a fruit fly. Just one, usually. It would hover in front of me, and eventually at a stop or something, I'd squish it against the windshield and that was that.

Then it dawned on me -- when I have fruit flies in the house, they're coming from somewhere. So I fuss at the children, insisting that one of them must have left an apple or something in the car and you know you're not allowed to eat in it, blah blah blah. Protestations of innocence all around.

One day, Thing 1 said, "I bet it's the refrigerator." These van conversions have a little under-seat refrigerator, just big enough to hold a weekend camping trip's dairy, or some such. When I heard her, I just stared.

The last camping trip was in October.

Last week, I pulled the refrigerator out of the car and opened it up. Since October, a half jug of orange juice and something in a storage container had been merrily riding along with us, a haven for a colony of fruit flies.

I've thrown the big stuff away, but haven't yet steeled myself to wash and bleach the rest. I hope the liquid sloshing around didn't break the fan and cooling unit.

At least there haven't been any more fruit flies.