Just lately - and I'm talking about the last couple of weeks or so - we have been plagued by flies. Actually, that's a bit strong. If I said there were six flies at any one time performing completely pointless flying and landing exercises within our walls, that would be about it. Still, one fly is annoying. I have adopted a much greater tolerance of the flying insect since moving to uber-rural climes and I can live with them in the great outdoors. However, when they invade our private, human-only space, a space dedicated to the perpetuation of me and the wife in comfortable relaxation, that's when the slightly damp tea towel comes out.
I have perfected the art of flicking the tea towel, much after the fashion of Indiana Jones's whip-cracking days, with pinpoint accuracy, laying a smug fly stunned and writhing on its back, wondering where the hell that lightning-fast image of Winchester Cathedral came from. There are two 'tricks' involved here. The first is to practice the towel-flicking. For me, having been to public school and suffered the oh-so-hilarious antics of those older boys practised in the art of getting that last inch of damp towel to whip round at, quite literally, the speed of sound just as it reaches the back of my thigh, I needed to unleash my revenge on the younger element of the communal showers. So, from quite a young age, I had it.
The other is to observe your fly. After flying around for no apparent reason, it will land. It needs to land on a flat area, such as a window or wall. And the landing area needs to be free from obstruction and/or items that could suffer damage. The last thing you need is to have your elation at a successful thwack sullied by your favourite mug becoming dislodged and ending up in pieces on the floor - you couldn't afford the Super Glue for one thing. Worse still, your wife's favourite mug... the end of that towel whipping round at a force that would ping, let's say a peanut, sixty feet (I know - I've tried it) could easily render a semi-fragile ornament worthless.
As mentioned (please see above) the fly will land. It will, maybe, wander around in a ludicrous weaving pattern until it decides it's safe in a single spot. It's taking a breather, a little rest until it decides there's more aimless aerobatics to be undertaken. Watch it. Watch it closely while you approach, stealthily, and draw back your slightly damp tea towel, poised in readiness for the strike. Take aim, carefully. Know your target. Identify with that part of the window, wall, flat surface of some kind, vertical almost always more successful than horizontal. And wait. You won't have to wait long. What are you waiting for?
You're waiting for that moronic, pointless, vexatious clump of cells to clean its front legs -and it will. It can't resist it, the smug little bugger. And that's when you strike. Thwack! You see, when it's cleaning its front legs, it's not quite so aware of Winchester Cathedral approaching it at Mach 2. Thwack! It's a gonner. Grin.
Okay, I'm guessing I'm not alone in being annoyed by flies - probably one or two others who can't quite seem to see the benefit of a disease-carrying upstart, totally oblivious to your personal space making its presence irritatingly known. But, I have to ask this question...
Is a fly that is silent more or less annoying than one that buzzes?
On the surface of it, prima facie as the lawyers might say, it would seem fairly obvious that a buzzing Biggles would win hands down on the irritability scale. But I would have to put the case for the silent fly, your honour. You see, the thing is, you know right away of the presence of a buzzing fly. It irks instantly. It rises the sap. The whining buzzy sound sends signals to your brain, resulting in an auto-response that has you leaping through to the kitchen for your weapon of choice and you wait for it to land, following the buzzy sound and easily spotting your target.
Whereas... your silent fly, well. It can fly around for hours undetected. It can go where it likes. It can land on your chopping board and run up an down it to its heart's content. It can alight on your toothbrush, your coffee mug, your beer glass, your freshly-ironed underwear (ok, that's just me then). You're settled. You're relaxed in your favourite armchair. You're absorbed in your Jodi Picoult novel (or your A R Grundy novel if you've any panache). You're happily reading the round up of the local court cases in your local paper. You don't know why but you're somehow comfortably numb in front of the telly. You're playing a game of Rummikub with your iPod on random. And then there it is! It can appear on the periphery, just out of the corner of your eye. Or it can be damned blatant and land on your book/newspaper/TV screen/Rummikub tiles! You didn't know it was there. You've no idea how long it's been hanging around; where it's been.
But you're relaxed, comfy, the tea towel seems such a long way away. It's not buzzing, so you leave it. You waft it away with the back of your hand. You forget about it. Momentarily. But then it's back! Flying around silently then landing on your book/newsp... well you know, again. Another waft of the hand, this time with a little more irritation. It's gone. You don't know where. You can't follow it's buzz and you certainly can't see the bloody thing. And then, the ultimate irritation, the throwing down of the gauntlet, the declaration of war...
It lands on your head! Just below the right temple, on that soft bit above your eyebrow. Well, that's it! Had it just flown away, carried on its pointless business elsewhere, it might have lived - for as long a a fly lives, anyway. But landing on your head, well that's simply pushing things too far! You gave it a couple of chances, didn't you? You gave it the opportunity, more than once (in case there are any Brahmins reading) to clear orf, to go about its business. But, no. It has to push the boundaries, just go that one step too far. And up you get, from you erstwhile comfortable position, heading for the tea towel that's not long since dried up the day's coffee mugs.
You return, you're goat got at. But where is it? Where is the pipsqueak? No buzzing, see? No buzzing, so you can't locate the swine. You hunt for it. You're looking at anything light, anything that will throw it into contrast. But it's not there. So now you're all riled up, ready with your tea towel, hurled reluctantly from your comfort and the bugger's disappeared! There's something in the corner of your eye, but no, or was it? You stand there for a full five minutes. It seems to know. It's playing a game and you're losing. And then... there it is! It's landed on your Rummikub tiles and you line up your tea towel. The wife says 'No!' envisaging your game, at least an hour in, ending up irretrievably on the floor. You know there's a risk. You know it's a horizontal surface and your chances are exponentially reduced, but it's got your dander up!
You flick. You miss. Your Rummikub tiles spill to the floor. The fly launches silently into your airspace. Your wife groans. She doesn't understand. Until that fly is stunned into giving up on its Holy Grail of annoyance, you can't rest. You pull back your tea towel for a second shot and once again you hunt...
You see what I mean? I could repeat the last two paragraphs ad infinitum. Without that buzz, as irritating as it is, you're on a hunting expedition, potentially for hours. You simply can't zone in on the thing. It evades your senses and you stand, poised in the lounge, tea towel pulled back, ready to pounce... Either that or you give up, apologize to the wife and try to re-assemble your Rummikub game. Or, failing a correct re-positioning of the tiles, concede manfully, raising your wife's wrist triumphantly into the air, declaring her the Rummikub champion - at least for that particular night.
So, what do you reckon? Is a fly that is silent more or less irritating than one that buzzes?
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