All right. I have to just admit it and deal with it: I need to get my  house fumigated. It just became too glaringly obvious last night to ignore any more. There I was, sitting in the bathtub, when I noticed something in the water that wasn't a rubber duckie or toy boat: it was a shark! I leapt out of that tub, let me tell you. You do not want your own personal genitalia in close proximity to a great white, even one that can fit in your bathtub. Thank god I was, as usual, wearing a full wetsuit, or I might have been seriously injured.

            But the shark in the bath was just the last straw. I also can no longer ignore the fact that there's a herd of wildebeest in my dining room. You try having a pleasant dinnertime conversation over sole a la bonne femme and a nice Graves when 400 gnus are grazing all around you. (What's gnu? My fucking dining room, that's what's gnu!) And you think you have a droppings problem when you've got mice? Dude, let me tell you: wildebeest are neither petite nor particularly hygienic in their pooing habits. I've had to buy wading boots. News to you, dude? That's gnus to me.

            Also, I think they're holding the Republican National Convention in my guest bathroom. I haven't seen any Republicans (they scuttle under the floorboards as soon as you turn on the light, and they're very fast), but the towels are all dirty, the soap has hair in it, and we still don't have a healthcare plan in there.

            I don't even want to talk about the evil clowns in my living room. You know what I hate about evil clowns? They're evil. And of course, clowns.

            Thank god the kids are away at college. Number Two Daughter is allergic to gnu fur. If she were living at home, she'd be coughing and her eyes would be tearing and she'd be shooting heat rays out of her eyes. My homeowner's insurance would go through the roof, you know? Just like the heat rays. Now, Number One Daughter is just the opposite; last time we had an infestation, she made a pet of one of the evil clowns. Until it killed and ate one of the neighbor kids and we had to have it put down. Man, did Number One Daughter cry. She'd named it Andre. The clown, not the neighbor kid, who presumably already had a name.

            I have to say, I'm not eager to fumigate because god knows what combination of noxious chemicals they'll have to use to get rid of everything that's living in my house now. I'm very sensitive to chemicals; as I told my kids the last time we were mixing Drano and bleach for their science fair volcano, two or three hours of huffing poisonous gases is all I can take, except for mustard gas, because that's awesome on hot dogs. (And also egg rolls, but you need the hot Chinese mustard gas for that.)  That aversion to poison gas is exactly why I stay away from the bean-burrito special at Mamacita's. Well, and also because I'm on the no-mariachi-music-playing list there.

(Sure, you do one mariachi rendition of "She's Lost Control Again," and you're banned for life. That's fair.)

            Actually, I've been calling around, and as it turns out, I may have to hire several exterminators, because they're so damn specialized. "Oh, sure, we'll take care of the evil clowns, but we don't do wildebeest."  (And how hard is it to get rid of evil clowns anyway? Drive up a small car, they all get in, drive the car into the Lake. Evil clown problem solved.) "No problem on the wildebeest, but you have to find someone else to do the sharks. We don't handle aquatic pests." And apparently nobody can get rid of the Republicans. Even when they're voted out of office.

            But fine, whatever, I'll call a dozen exterminators, as long as they get rid of the damn infestations. I can't take this any more. The Republican National Convention last night nominated Sarah Palin for President and I didn't get a wink of sleep.

            And I'm not sure, but last night after my shark-infested bath, when I headed to my kitchen for a nice midnight paella, just as I flipped the light on I think I saw, out of the corner of my eye, a group of ontological doubts vanish into the woodwork. Shit, man, that's going to cost me a couple of hundred extra, easy.