Reality bites

This is the inaugural piece in a series on people who are habitually terrorized by diminutive creatures.

My blood must be sweet and fruity. Or perhaps sour and obnoxious, depending on the mosquito's palate. Whatever his taste buds, I fell victim overnight to the buzzer's need to reenact Dracula. My left arm is covered with pink track marks that travel down to the finger tips, up to the earlobe and end at the eyelid. I now look like a junkie who got a well deserved beatdown from her pimp.

I must have left my left side exposed when I passed out soundly last night because he attacked that half exclusively. I hazily remember mercilessly scratching the tip of my ring finger during sleep, except at the time I thought it was part of my nightly dream. The finger was in a tizzy, a bit bloated, full of juicy red blood concentrated at the top that was on standby to gush out at the nudging of a swift prick. I didn't realize that the sensation and my uncensored reaction had really occurred overnight until I started typing this morning and felt inordinate ticklish sensitivity on my finger at the touch of a key.

As much as mosquito bites disgust and irritate me to the point of insanity, the helplessness of being bitten in inconvenient locations devastates me. I generally don't like going to places that pose challenges - anything from stress-inducing traffic, lack of public transportation, to toll roads or threat of being shot - so I try to avoid roadblocks. That being said, I wish the mosquitoes would steer clear of the following body parts if they can hear me right now:

1) Feet, especially the soles. The thick layer of skin that only gets harder with age makes it impossible to satisfactorily scratch the hell out of the sole. It's like raking anesthetized skin: futile, except it still itches so I'm compelled to stab or jab the hardened skin with sharp sundry objects.
2) Ears. Ears are a sensitive part of the body as is. Hello, infant earaches anyone? They also present added difficulties due to their uneven surface area. They may be waxy, but they're definitely not smooth. Bumpy roads mean I can't reach the mosquito bite. The only recourse is to slap my ear silly until I begin to hear high frequency buzzing from all the masochistic activity.
3) Toes and fingertips. I don't know the science of why it tingles rather than itches when I get bites on my digits, but scratching or leaving x imprints on my fingers and toes makes me want to scream from the edges of a treacherous cliff.
4) Armpits. This must mean I was sleeping in victory mode, exposing my pits and all. Let me just say that when I'm sitting there scratching my armpits like it's nobody's business, I look like a flea-infested circus monkey waiting for a banana.
5) Eyelids. Only useful if you want to achieve the "I've cried for you all night (in one eye only)" look or you want to report your bad behaving boyfriend to the cops for abuse.

The thought of being terrorized by something you can wipe out with a clap of your hands is quite silly and brings me a chuckle. Ladies and gentleman, when squishing manually, timing is everything. Once you perfect that, you can celebrate the victory by holding your applause until the next time.