Don't Let the Bedbugs Bite

Brian and I had an interesting week. And by interesting I mean irritating. So much so that it was actually funny. And by funny I mean ironic, not funny ha-ha.

We spent most of our time here in a perfectly acceptable hotel room. Two beds, a kitchenette, a bathroom, free coffee - all the usual hotel room stuff. It was honestly starting to feel like "home." Even better, it was the kind of home where nice women come by daily to clean up after us and coo at JJ in Spanish. At least that's what I think they were doing. Maybe they were just saying, "You poor baby! Why are your parents making you live in a hotel room for weeks at a time?" I choose to believe the former.

I was beginning to love hotel life. That was until some unwelcome visitors decided to move in as well. Meet the visitors:

Early last week, I noticed these little blood-sucking devils in various places around our room. First, I saw one or two in the bathroom, then we noticed several of them on the ceiling. It didn't occur to me that these were bedbugs until I pulled out the telephoto lens and did a bit more research. Boy, wasn't that a great idea for a germaphobe? Researching bedbugs on the internet. Thank you, Wikipedia. I learned so much from you. Like the fact that bedbugs don't just live in the bed. And how I might look if ten thousand bedbugs decided to bite me at once.

Anyhow, I was kind of in a tizzy as you can guess. Did you read my bucket list? Did you see number 23? It was after midnight, the hotel was fully booked, and I was looking at spending another night in this room with at least a dozen other unwelcome guests (that I could count), and I was NOT very happy about it. I immediately started stripping the entire family down to our underwear to look for bites. Brian loved it. JJ not so much. Of course, the only bites we could find were on our baby, and that put me in a whole other realm of irritated. I was screaming, "You mean we're going to have to sleep in this room another night with a whole army of bedbugs eating our child alive? I am NOT okay with that!"

Poor Brian was just trying to solve the problem. Clearly, I wasn't going to take the advice of the woman at the front desk and spray Raid Ant & Roach spray all over the room. Why don't I just have bedbugs AND toxic chemicals flying through the air? Thanks for the suggestion, but no. Brian said, "We'll do what we have to do, Katy. I'll even pack this room up right now and find us a hotel room in town." And THAT'S why I love him so...

I thought about it. I seriously considered it. And had it not been after midnight I might have gone through with it. But I was tired, and I wasn't about to let these nasty bugs keep us up all night in a foreign city where we don't speak the language looking for a hotel room. Somehow, that seemed more dangerous than a few bites.

So, I decided to act like a big girl. I got into bed dressed from head to toe in tight-fitting clothing. I did the same for JJ. If those little jerks were going to bite us, they were going to have to suffocate to do it. Unless, of course, they decided to go for our faces again. Dang it, outsmarted by bedbugs!

I swore to Brian that I wouldn't be able to sleep through the night, but I made it. Honestly, as soon as I hit the pillow, I was out. Maybe I got so worked up that I wore myself out. Maybe it's because I haven't slept in six months. Maybe it's because I was nestled in my own 100% bamboo sheets. Or maybe, just maybe, I've conquered my fear of hotel beds...bedbugs and all! Even if it's all of the above, I believe that this situation fulfills number 23, and I will officially cross it off my bucket list. Take that, you nasty bedbugs!

The next morning we moved to another room. Within 24 hours, the shower flooded the bathroom, the A/C unit leaked water all over the floor, and the smoke alarm went off for no reason at 2 a.m.

Needless to say, we're looking forward to getting back home. And that's a good thing, really. I guess we needed some serious motivation to leave this 80 degree, sunny paradise to return to a rainy, dreary island. But I can't wait to jump into our bug-free bed and sleep like I haven't slept in weeks!