Malathion gets a bad rap.

How I miss the old days when the fogger would come through my neighborhood, spreading the poison which kept us mosquito-free. Of course, we had disfigured animals, babies with 3 heads, etc., but we could walk outside, confident in the fact that the peskiest of pests had been eradicated.

It ain't so simple anymore. Morris County, NJ has one of the best mosquito control divisions in the country. Teams of biologists head out into the forests (yes, they have those in NJ!) and fields to search out and destroy mosquito breeding grounds. I don't ever remember getting mosquito-bitten in NJ. Maybe they're afraid of the Teamsters.

Anyway, the result of all this science in NJ is that ALL THE MOSQUITOES COME TO NORTH CAROLINA! That's right - we plow, plant, cultivate, spray and even lobby to keep our tobacco plants healthy, but god forbid we should lay one finger on a mosquito! The first year I was here, all the neighbors said the mosquitoes were the worst ever. Since then, it's gotten worse.

I'd gladly ask my wife (who works for a living, unlike me) to kick in an extra buck or two in taxes each year if the city, county or state would step up and do something about the damn mosquitoes. Already, birds and horses in remote parts of NC (where people keep their gun by the door and their teeth in a jar) are getting infected with West Nile, encephalitis and god knows what other skeeter-borne diseases. And what do we do about it? We WARN people!! Yeah, that always works. So I'm thinking of buying stock in Off and Cutter, since I keep a 55-gallon barrel of Deet on the porch to dip my daughter in when she goes outside to play.

Maybe when our babies' heads swell up like melons we'll do something about it, like bring back Malathion. Hmm, swollen heads or 3 healthy ones - you decide.