Not a novel, but a novelty….

Saturday, Aug 16, 2008

Not a novel, but a novelty….

I have to indulge myself, just for a moment…

Although this has absolutely nothing to do with my reading habit and subsequent blogs, I had a “mom” moment yesterday that I just had to share.

Yesterday, my daughters and I were in the park with our doggies. It was a lovely day and as the kids played in the playground, I laid under a big tree in the grass… holding the dogs’ leashes as they rested with me. As I lay there, I saw a fly amounst the grass blades. It was very large and I wondered if it was dead; “probably so,” I thought. Moments later, my daughter Cole walked up to me and I asked her what she thought of the insect. For those of us who know Colie well, you know that, at times, she has such a dry, witty, and intellegent sense of humor at the oddest times. Simply, Cole told me that the fly was dead and I agreed.

Cole sat down beside me and began to pet Claire, our basset hound. She said to me, “Mom, did you know that the fly only has a lifespan of 3 days?” I lifted my head and said, “really?” From across the sandbox, her rather bossy and “know-it-all” twin shouted, “NOOO! It lives for 10 days!” From there, as my family and friends can attest and have witnessed on multiple occasions, the banter began: “3″, “No, 10″, “It’s 3, really!”, “Cole, it is not 3 days, for sure it’s 10!”, and so on and so forth. After 5 minutes of the constant bickering, I tell them, as usual, to “knock it off!” Cole settles back down into the grass.

“Mom.”

“Yes?”

“What do you think the fly does in the 3 days that it is alive?”

“I don’t know, Cole.”

“I bet that on Day One, she learns how to fly, yada, yada, yada. Then, the next day, she falls in love with her mate and gets married. On her last day, she has babies and then she dies,” explained Cole.

(In the background, Bossy Boots in yelling, “No, Cole, that’s not what happens” and starts her rendition of the fly’s life of which I chose to ignore.

“So, Cole…. that’s it, she learns to fly, get’s hooked up, gives birth and then dies?” I chuckled.

“Yeah, that’s what I bet she does.”

“Cole, the poor girl… all that just to croak?”

Colie starts laughing as do I.

So, if you had three days to live, what would you do in those three days? That’s a hard question for me to answer. But, I guess she’s right, in a wierd way. I would learn to walk, think and soar. Then, I would fall in love and most likely have babies. Perhaps she was right, afterall! But, the “yada, yada, yada” was freakin’ classic!

So, I went out with my girlfriend Danielle last night for drinks. I tell her Colie’s story. She tells me, well, Nicole may actually be right… you better do your research on it first because they do live an abnormally short life. For those who are curious on whether Cole or Bossy Boots was right:

The House Fly – Life Cycle

These are the four distinct stages in an average house fly’s life:

Egg: Depending on the size of a female house fly, she can lay up to 500 eggs in a three to four day period. Eggs are white in color and are usually less than half and inch in size.

Larvae: Larvae are commonly referred to as maggots. Maggots emerge from the eggs within eight to 20 hours of being laid. Larvae begin eating whatever they can find in the area they were laid. They prefer warm, moist environments to grow in.

Pupa: After about four to 10 days, a maggot will move to higher, drier ground to move into the pupa stage of its life. This process take about three to six days and is where the maggot encases inself in a reddish-brown skin where the final stages of development take place.

Adult: Once the adult house fly hatches from the pupal stage, it has an approximate life span of 15 to 30 days. Females are able to start producing eggs after two days of life and will continue to lay eggs for about a month. Female house flys are usually larger than the males.

The House Fly – A Day in the Life

You will find house flies pretty much everywhere there are humans or animals. Flies love things like garbage, manure and anything else that left out in a warm environment (like the chicken you left thawing on your counter all day). House flies don’t feed off of human flesh – they get their nutrients from spitting saliva on their food, which liquifies it so they can suck it up with their sponge-like mouths.

The House Fly – Did U Know?

House flies can travel up to six miles in 24 hours, but they usually prefer to stay close by their breeding ground.

The easiest way to keep flies out of your home is to keep things clean. Don’t leave food lying around, make sure you take out the garbage on a regular basis and wipe up messes right away.

Fly investations are often found on farms because it is hard to keep them from breeding in the readily available manure.

House flies like to perch on things like wire or string.

The newest show on Disney, The Buzz on Maggie, follows the life of a family of flies that live in the fictional town of Stickyfeet.

Got me to thinking, what about the rest of the planet?

MAMMALS	YEARS

Elephant	69

Horse	50

Hippopotamus	49

Chimpanzee	40

Grizzly Bear	32

Bison	30

Lion	30

Tiger	25

Elk	22

Mountain Lion	20

Beaver	19

Wolf	16

Squirrel	16

Chipmunk	12

Cottontail	10

House Mouse	4

BIRDS	YEARS

Turkey Buzzard	118

Swan	102

Parrot	80

Great Horned Owl	68

Eagle	55

English Sparrow	23

Canary	22

Humming Bird	8

FISH	YEARS

Catfish	60

Eel	55

Carp	47

Mosquitofish	2

REPTILES	YEARS

Giant Tortoise	152

Box Turtle	123

Alligator	68

Snapping Turtle	57

Cobra	28

Cottonmouth	21

AMPHIBIANS	YEARS

Giant Salamander	55

Toad	36

Bullfrog	30

Mud Puppy	23

Green Frog	10

Newt	7

INSECTS	YEARS

Cicada	17

Ant (queen)	15

Good grief… what a Giant Tortoise must see in her lifetime….. enough for several husbands and many grandkids! Can’t wait to hear what Colie thinks of how she’ll spend her life! Come to think of it, those turtles live a long time! I wonder if there is something to be said about living life in a slower pace. Just look at the hummingbird… burns out after only 8 years.

Anyway, kids do say the darndest things!