Heat Wave

It’s strange how kids can run round in short sleeves in the midst of winter unaffected by the cold yet the stifling heat of this week renders them incapable of anything but rolling round moaning.

Somehow I got the blame for this week’s heat wave.

“I’m soooo sweaty,” Miss Seven lamented.

“Look mum, feel this,” Master Seven exclaimed between moans, indicating the beads of sweat dripping down behind his knee as he rolled around on the floor.

Usually humidity reduces one’s appetite but, such was the heat-induced boredom this week, mine have eaten me out of house and home. As a result, we’ve made two trips to the supermarket this week to conduct our ‘weekly shop’.

I tried everything: putting fans in every room, rolling down the shade sail to fully block the sun, a make-shift paddling pool, taking them to the beach (but by the time we’d returned home, we were hot and sweaty again), making hand-made fans and ice blocks, showing them how to fan themselves with their sheets. But Miss Seven insisted on sleeping under her duvet, for fear the cockroaches get her in the night.

Yes, unlike us humans, the cockroaches must be pretty happy about this temperature rise and our house is a magnet for them. It traps the heat to the point that, as soon as you hit the top stair, it slaps you in the face like you’ve walked into a sauna.

The other night I was in the shower when I heard Miss Seven come hurtling downstairs screaming blue murder.

“What has he done this time?” I called, expecting Master Nine to be the culprit.

“A-a-a, cockroach, f-f-fell on my leg off the r-r-r-roof and crawled up my nightie!” she wailed while simultaneously conducting what looked to be a convulsive version of the Highland Fling.

I could feel her fear. When I was a teenager, a giant Weta dropped off the ceiling while I was lying in bed. I was alerted to its descent when I felt its feeler stroking my cheek. 

Going by the state of her inability to keep still whilst clawing at her nightie, I would imagine that, like me, she’d reacted like Scooby Doo chancing upon a ghost.

This cockroach, in particular, had made itself at home on our lounge ceiling earlier in the week and was last seen hovering above the coach while the kids watched Frozen.

After checking and reassuring Miss Seven that it was no longer in her nighty and, in fact, was probably more petrified of her than she was of it (although this was hard to imagine) I managed to calm her down by rather badly singing Sound of Music’s 'Favourite Things'.

“Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens …”

She joined in and peace was restored.

I subsequently found said cockroach, which I’d been informed Master Nine had killed with Miss Seven’s drink bottle (to which she tearfully declared she was never drinking from again). It was wriggling its way painfully across the floor. I can’t kill a thing, even if it is to put it out of its misery, so I tentatively scooped it up between two cups at arm’s length and threw it outside.

Later that night whilst reading in bed I saw something dark flash in my peripheral. It was a giant cockroach scuttling across my floor! My god that thing was fast - and freaky! I looked around for something to scoop it up with but there was nothing big enough so I reluctantly watched it scuttle up my wall and make its way into my wardrobe, taking note to shake all contents before donning in future.

The cat came in next and started chasing something round the room. It turned out to be a smaller cockroach. What was this – cockroach central?!

I was too tired and hot to care anymore so, with the fan blasting hot air at me, drifted into a sticky, fitful sleep which featured cockroaches centre-stage.