Fly Patrol

For those of you who don't know, it's been hella hot here in the SFV lately (95-100+ the last 4-5 days) . Not much to do. Too hot to go to the park. Too hot to garden. Too hot to even walk to the damn car to go somewhere. The classes we've been taking are on break until after Labor Day. You can only go to the market and Target so many times, so we've been stuck at home. There is only so much TV you want your kid to watch, and there are only so many books that they want to read. So what do you do?
It's been so hot, flies come into the house any chance they get to get some relief from the heat. So, what's the new ritual in this house lately? Fly patrol.
This ritual usually starts with Jared saying, "Uh oh, fly." with one hand dramatically over an open mouth. Then, "I get towel!". Stomp stomp stomp to the Kleenex box. Pulls two tissues out. Then, "Dada! Fly!" Next ensues a 10-15 minute march around the house. Paul first with the deadly rolled-up magazine. Not far behind him is Jared with tissues in hand repeating, "I catch fly!" I then have to get into the ridiculous hunt. Imagine the three of us marching around the house. Calling to the fly, "Where are you? Where is it?". A 2 year old repeating "I catch fly". Then Jared usually gets ambitious and starts suggesting where the fly might be. "Fly in choo choo?...Nooo" "Mama, fly in bag?...Nooo" "Fly in window?...Nooo" "Fly in books?...Nooo" This is accompanied by the boy opening drawers, looking inside bags, opening books. It's quite hilarious. I'm usually the one that gets tired of marching around, but how do you disappoint the boy? I usually suggest to Paul, "Let's tell him it went outside and flew home to it's mommy & daddy", which usually works when other bugs/birds/cats go away. But then, Paul gets obsessed with getting the fly. So then I stand by and watch the scene of a grown man with a rolled up magazine grumbling about some fly and a 2 year old occasionally piping in "There it is!", when usually it isn't. Finally, after much pursuit, Paul approaches the poor fly who's landed on some random surface due to exhaustion, tells Jared, "Back up, Jared" and then a loud WHACK. That's usually followed by a couple more WHACKS. Then, it's Jared for the clean up. Approaching the dead thing, picks it up with the two tissues, and proudly announce, "I catch fly!" with a big smile. Then it's straight for the trash can in the kitchen. Everyone then celebrates with a cool popsicle.