Unlucky in Bugs

I’m not one to go from meticulous quarantining of all fabrics back to normal overnight. (Didn’t help that my cheap Ikea dresser was dying a violent death.) After some hemming and hawing, I decided that I could start leaving out worn items, because – duh – they need to be washed anyway, so keeping them in plastic wasn’t really going to save me any trouble down the line.

Still, scary, if definitely also an Excitement a Bedbugger Can Understand:

I, of course, have been aching to take my clothes out of plastic bags.  I reached the two-month mark set by my pest control company just as the seasons began to change and I was sorely in need of the jackets, scarves, gloves, sweaters, and pants that were smooshed into garbage bags in my sad, sad closet.

And yet, not wanting to be in the position of having to do seven loads of laundry in case of a reinfestation, I needed a strategy.

So I made a trip to The Container Store on 59th St. and Lex and got three big storage bins.  I spent several hours one Sunday in September slowly but systematically unpacking my garbage bags and packing my out-of-season stuff, extra linens, and other fabric items into the bins, which I taped around the edges with blue painter’s tape.  I categorized the three bins as: (1) clothes, (2) bags, and (3) linens and towels.

I packed all in-season items into two Space Bags and four Ziploc Big Bags, with another Ziploc Big Bag in my front closet for my jackets.

My six other categories for the bags were as follows.  For the Space Bags: (1) tops – work shirts and blouses and nice casual tops, and (2) bottoms – skirts and pants.  For the Ziploc Big Bags: (1) sweats, shorts, and tees, (2) dresses, (3) washable winter knits, and (4) dry clean only winter knits.

I couldn’t have been more excited if Bob Barker himself had announced its arrival.

The long-awaited Sealy Posturepedic Preferred Park Meadows arrived this past Wednesday (Day 64), and the I-800-Mattress movers were kind enough to put on my National Allergy Encasements. Just in time to lull me into 12-hour long periods of post-Thailand jet lag sleep.

Waking up from such a sleep, way late for work on Friday, I ran into my downstairs neighbor (she of the early morning phone call of the damned), and she said she put back on her encasements and her bed bug problem is gone again!