Nothing to Love About Lovebugs

It's lovebug season in Florida. The common name "lovebug" has been given to these black colored, orange-backed flies because they are most often seen flying around in mating pairs. Lovebug swarms were everywhere today. Attracted to exhaust fumes and light, they fly around butt to butt, attached at the tail end, large females dragging smaller males. They seem to go willingly. They smash into moving vehicles all over the state and make a terrible mess. Many people carry a bucket of water and a soft scrubby in the car to clean off squashed bugs. Windshield wiper fluid just doesn't cut it. I have never seen lovebug swarms this thick. Getting out of the car in the bank parking lot today I felt like something out of Hitchcock's "The Birds," only it wasn't birds, it was bugs. I had bugs crawling up my sleeves, flying into my mouth (a good reason to shut up...), and invading the car every time I opened a door. This morning I found one in my shower. They are harmless, but pesky. And splattered lovebugs sure can ruin a car's finish, not to mention clogging radiator fins and obscuring a driver's vision.

I'm trying to wrap up work projects, pay the bills, pack my bags and hit the road with my better half, M, and our dog, Murphy. I cleaned the van, picked up all the remaining dropped grapefruit from the back yard (excellent hurricane projectiles!), and am in the process of doing all the last minute stuff that precedes a long vacation. Take the car to the tire place to have tires rotated, oil changed, fluids and belts checked, etc. Then off to the supermarket to buy food for the 2000 mile trip. Road food is disgusting. It seems much more healthy to bring my own meals in a cooler, not to mention more tasty. I'd rather have a root canal than survive on nasty road food.

I am debating whether to put the hurricane shutters on the house before I leave. It seems too early in the season for shutters. Will I do the brave thing and leave the house unprotected from The Evil Wind? Or will I wimp out and spend a day installing our old plywood shutters with PLYLOX?

PLYLOX is such a simple, yet brilliant, invention. A PLYLOX is a little metal clip that fits snugly on the edges of a 1/2 inch plywood board cut to fit inside a window casement. PLYLOX are strong and easy to install. No screws, just pop the shutters in. Removal is a bit more difficult, requiring an extra pair of hands. All in all, though, a $500 investment for plywood shutters is far less expensive than $10,000 for commercially made shutters, and just as strong. A little less pretty, but hey...

I wish I'd invented Ply-Lox.