Central Texas has quite the infestation of mosquitoes this year. We had a very wet spring and now we are celebrating buy buying lots of cans of insect repellant. We have the typical dusk-loving mosquitoes, but this year there seems to be a brazen new strain of bugs that come out during the day. It’s kind of like those campy old vampire movies where suddenly the vampires become immune to sunlight. It changes everything. This year I can’t sit out by the pool without getting eaten alive. Even in the middle of the afternoon. Mosqitoes, what is going on? Whence the superhuman strength?

The upshot is that I have bug bites all over me. I hear every adult voice in my head telling me not to scratch. But one day I just though, “Who cares? Why shouldn’t I scratch? Scratching just means they’ll stop itching sooner.” Which is true. I congratulated myself on going against the flow and feeling free enough to scratch as I pleased. But now there is a big problem; I have gross scabs and scars from scabs. Especially on my legs.

They look horrid.

And no amount of fake tanner can camouflage a scab.

Maybe all those voices telling me not to scratch knew what they were talking about. Darn. I hate when those voices are right.