It's Murder at the Buy-Right

4

"Mawnin', Miz Midge," Daisy Ann said. "Nice day, ain't it?"

"If you like gnats 'n midges flyin' round your brains 'n eggs. Not to mention flies buzz landin' and takin' off on your hominy."

"Midge has midges," muttered Daisy Ann.

She bit her lip to keep from laughing out loud.

"Niles ain't fixed the screens on your kitchen windows, has he?"

This last remark from Daisy Ann was louder.

"No, he hasn't. I swear I wouldn't be surprised if I woke up one morning all swolled up like a basketball and just as dimply from all the bug bites I suffer through during the night."

"They are bad this year. I remember a few years ago, I went to one of them big warehouse stores, and I got me a Dynamo Gynormous Bug Zapper," Daisy said. "It was the biggest one in the store. Industrial size, they called it. I took that baby home. All I had to do was plug that big boy up and watch the sparks fly.

It was a sight to behold, I mean to tell you!

Pow! Pop! Zappo! Zing! ZZZZtttttt! Ka-blewy!

Blue bolts of electrified extermination!

Like fireworks on the Fourth. I'd never witnessed such in all my life!"

"Sounds amazing."

"You'd think," Daisy Ann said. "But it didn't work out like I thought."

"It didn't?"

"Nah," Daisy Ann said. "I started getting calls from the neighbors at all hours wanting to know if I'd opened a crack house or something."

"You're kidding!" Midge said.

"I wish I was. I'm as serious as size twelve wide feet in size three shoes. They told me my zapper was lighting up the whole neighborhood. They said I looked like the biggest blue-light district around."

"So what's wrong with adding a little color to the neighborhood?" Midge asked.

"I'm like you. I didn't know that's what that meant either. But it was bad. Anyway, besides the fact that it was giving my house a bad reputation, my Dynamo Bug Zapper got clogged up with all those bugs something terrible!"

"I can imagine," said Midge.

"No. I doubt you can," said Daisy Ann. "Take your worst thought and multiply that by about a gazillion million. Girl, I had a fit when I saw that mess! I felt like THE undertaker for insects!

"Really?"

"You better believe 'really.' And it was murder on my light bill, too. I think I still got it stored in a box in the garage. You can borrow it if you want it."

"No, thanks," Midge said.

"I don't blame you. Who wants to wear the label: Spectacle on My Street!"

"Not me."

"Me, neither. Maybe, Niles could plug up any holes in your walls that might let them in when he fixes your screens," Daisy Ann said.

"I'll be in my grave before that happens," Midge said. "Boy's out all hours. He only lights to take a shower once in a blue moon. Claims he's fishing all the time. I declare, that boy ain't worth thirty-seven cents! He don't never stay home!"

"He comes in here pretty often. At all times of the day," said Daisy Ann. "How's his luck?"

"If he wasn't mine," said Midge, "I'd say, it stinks. He ain't much of a fisherman if you go by the haul he brings in. Huh! We'd starve if I didn't shop here!"