Can't live with them, can't live without them. (Pesticides)

Much as I'm disgusted by pesticides I've got to note here, for the record if for nothing else, that the substance known as Raid is a miracle unto man. Every year 'round these times my kitchen becomes a staging location for a battalion (or is at a platoon? a company? I'm not familiar with much military lingo.....) of invading ants. From here, the corner of my well-worn larder, where I've done some of my best thinking, the ants take aim upon my entire abode -- they send out light, maneuverable, highly successful sorties toward my bedroom, my bathroom, the cats' playroom, and by the time Christmas falls the whole place has often been captured, conquered, occupied. Everywhere you look you see nothing but the spindly little legs and the uncaring faces of this invading force, and of course there's always the marching, the constant hup-two-three-four in a formation so disciplined, so precise, so ordered you'd think you were watching a Leni Riefenstahl film.

You'd suppose that I'd be able to ignore these tiny creatures, but you'd be wrong: A man's heart is not settled when his land's been violated. How can I ponder the finer points of democracy when I've been usurped in my own home? As I've said a million times before, freedom does not flourish under occupation.

Over the years I've tried many weapons in my rebellion against these ants. Non-violence has been my paramount concern: I've caulked shut the window openings, I've used a Chinese ant-repelling chalk hailed for its pseudo-magical powers, I've invested in a home-wide, high-pitched sonic device designed to keep away pests of all sorts. All of it in vain (and my cat Disraeli developed a quite-painful tinnitus as a consequence of the last one.) So this year, despite, I'll admit, my better ethics, I took the advice of my once-a-year housekeeper Mrs. Lopez (no relation, I've determined after much intrepid inquiry, to the other more famous (and more fabulous!) Ms. Lopez) and purchased a can of Raid.

God in heaven, what a thing you have bestowed upon us in this unassuming can! Just one spray in the larder upon the marching enemy and like that, faster than you can say IED, the rebellion was on. (To be sure, cat lovers, I kept the area off-limits to the felines.) Invisible, virtually odorless, and so painless -- killing was never meant to be so easy, but here we are.

And so, the upshot: The ants, succumbing the long-lasting power of this magic substance, have packed up and gone away. Self-determination has once again prevailed.