A flappy tale.

Apparently South London has a moth epidemic. Not the ones which flap around dementedly when you turn on a light, but the ones who fester in dark, dank cupboards, eating your finest cashmere jumpers and then snoozing lazily, the ones who make everything smell musty and dusty and nasty and make you feel squeamish when you see them. The ones, if you like, that you associate with death, rotting and larvae. My skin’s crawling even as I type.

A little while ago, I noticed that there were a fair few of these small silvery moths fluttering around the bedroom at Steves. Another week down the line and I made the connection between the moths and the cupboards, not exactly qualifying me for mensa I know, but there is a direct correlation between opening cupboard doors and the little critters flying out. Suddenly, the penny dropped. Perhaps it’s a little mini moth party and then I realised, my our clothes were in serious peril.

I began searching frantically online for details of ‘infestations of cupboard moths’ and how we might go about getting rid of them and it seems they come straight from the dark ages. They are proper double ‘ard little bastards and no lie. Apparently, the thing to do is to find the source of the moths and destroy that, so we need to find the larvae. They are about ½ cm long, white wriggly things that you might find on the end of a fishermans hook I suppose. The problem is finding the critters. Apparently they bury into jumpers/duvets/anything soft and warm and tasty and make a home there. As you’d expect the internet provided me with a whole host of solutions from the sublime to the ridiculous. One person said that the only thing which would get rid of them was to freeze the larvae, so had bought a chest freezer in which she stored her entire families’ winter wardrobe. Another poor person had moved home in desperation to get rid of the moths, only to find that she had kindly paid the removal people to bring them with her, in a pringle jumper. Some waxed lyrical about moth balls and various other chemicals whilst the hippies extolled the virtues of lavender.

So what are we going to do? Well, it’s simple, we’re going to leave the flat soon enough and make sure we buy an entire winter wardrobe when we do (just in case they follow us you understand).

In the meanwhile, we have left a note for the cleaner, you think I’m joking don’t you? Sadly, I’m not. Neither me nor Steve have the stomach for any of this, and she is similarly double ‘ard and will no doubt lick those little f**kers in no time at all. Go Alena. We love you.