Monday, July 07, 2008

Whining little insect

It probably sounds like a public schoolboy insult from Ripping Yarns, but I mean mosquitoes. It's only tea-time, but I'm starting to feel the effects of a very disturbed night's sleep, thanks to the high-pitched whining of a mosquito flying around my head. I've got loads of reading and writing to do at the moment, plus a dodgy knee still feeling the effects of being vigorously wiggled in all directions by a physiotherapist, and then a flipping mosquito kept me awake for hours when I really needed my sleep. Pesky blighter.

Moan moan... oh no, I'm doing human whining, like the mosquito but I don't bite...

I kept thinking mosquito-related things, in my half-asleep state... anopheles mosquitoes... malaria carrying ones, I remember from my schooldays in Zambia... you can spot them by their sticking-out bottoms when they land on the wall... or is when their bodies point downwards... no malaria here, global warming's not that bad yet... I could draw a bilharzia fluke if someone asked me... and a tapeworm.... like a segmented worm with a wig on... hhm that would have been useful decades ago on a different continent...didn't Link Wray do a song called The Mosquito... oh no, it was a Hornet... did he like insects then... can't tell from instrumentals because no lyrics...

... and then it was morning, and the postman arrived with my new recipe books. Not a very productive day PhD-wise, but ho hum, that's life. The rambling hallucinations of a sleepy mind are very strange though, remembering snippets from early school lessons. There's a whining insect noise on the Biting Insects website... ugh, that's enough for today.

You've probably guessed that the image is not an annoying mosquito, it's a rather nice looking plastic 3D anatomic stag beetle puzzle (via Boing Boing).

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Pardon me, m'dear, but isn't the malaria-carrying mossy the Culicine. i.e. the female?

Anonymous said...

Gosh! I've just had a look and, d'you know what? 'Tis the ruddy Anopholine. No wonder I couldn't control malaria in our unit!
Yet again, Claire is right. I recommend an immediate PhD.

Claire said...

Could well be, I just remembered the anopheles being one of the species that carried malaria. Maybe within that type, it's the female. I was only about 7 when we did it at school, so I find any memories of it slightly bizarre really.

Claire said...

Oh blimey Dickiebo, we've both posted a comment at the same time!!!! So my proverbial 'little grey cells' are intact after all!

Anonymous said...

Sorry, pal. But at least you have proved B right - she always reckons that I'm a confused ol' man!

Katy Swift said...

Oh hun sorr you had such a bad night's kip. It's miserable when it happens and then you have to somehow function the next day. I'm fortunate that I'm used to it and cope reasonably well.

Hope you had a better night and that the PhD is coming along well.

deb said...

Hi, I feel so remiss in not keeping in touch. I'm making a vow to myself to get back to blog friends. You know how it is...work, work, work. I feel like i can't get a chance to come up for air.

Well, your 'half-dream state' comment reminded me of my first thoughts as I awoke this morning....Yay I'm alive! I'd dreamed that someone, don't have a clue who it was, said that they would murder me in the morning. Creepy.

Claire said...

Dickiebo, you could be right too, might well be the female... they do often say she is deadlier than the male, don't they!

Hottie, thanks I do feel better, just needed a blog-moan and sleep! Phd is fine, apart from being 'very very good' last week I am also apparently held up as a shining example of staff development - an 'exemplar'!! Me!!

Deb, I wouldn't worry about it, I've been dreadful about reading blogs and commenting for ages now, not because I don't like blogs (or people) either, it's a lack-of-time thing for me. Can't bear to spend longer on a computer than I have to when I've been on it all day for work.

And I hope you weren't having a 'vision' in your dream and are still with us... sounds rather disturbing really.

deb said...

Still kicking!
:-D