In central Florida, it doesn't get very cold in the winter. It does, however, get cold quite suddenly, forcing bugs to take shelter or relocate unexpectedly. Combined with cold winter rains, this means that people will often find themselves surrounded with tiny unwelcome guests in the winter months.

Why do I mention this? Well, due to the weather, I suddenly found myself with a small colony of black ants invading my living space, some of them braving my favorite arm chair and bed to get a piece of me. The interesting part, I found, is that I would sometimes have two or three on me and not even notice. What I did notice was them biting or stinging me on my chest, face, and other areas you'd expect to have felt a creature walking.

I also noticed that individual ants can be pretty hard to kill. Pulling one off of my neck and rolling it between my thumb and forefinger, I was surprised to see the little balled-up ant slowly get its legs and antennae back in order and walk along my finger like nothing had happened. Repeatedly stamping on a line of ants leading to my chair, I was again surprised to find a fair number of survivors- and that was with my bare feet, making contact with a solid wood floor.

Between how resilient and stealthy the little buggers are, it occurred to me that they provided excellent solutions to problems I've run into while writing stories of size content.

They Call It Karma