Sin... Ants in your Pants...

Ants in your pants, apparently, make your belly button dance.

I'm sure that, if ants were indeed crawling around in my pants, it wouldn't just be my belly button dancing. I'd be bouncing around like a bungee jumping Pinocchio if the little blighters were invading my interiors. They'd be like moving grains of sand - getting into all my nooks and crannies no matter how I tried to brush them off.

I don't mind flies, spiders, moths or man-eating mosquitoes, but ants get to me.

Maybe it's because I expect them to be able to club together and carry me off to their nest. I'd be their Gulliver and they'd be victorious in their conquest of me. If an ant can carry multiple times its own body weight, I don't suppose a whole nest's worth would have a problem carting me off. The food in this place isn't exactly nourishing. Or appetising. Or, really, anything resembling actual food. Any ants would be better off with the likes of me rather than anything the kitchen might produce.

It's almost as if the food goes through a filter and all of the goodness is sucked out, leaving us with the pallid, paltry remnants. I suppose that filter would be like the digestive system - all the vitamins and nutrients are removed for the good of the body and all the crap is expelled. The slop they serve us essentially is another four letter word that begins with 'S.' Rather than it saying 'Lo' to a 'P', though, it says 'Hi' to a 'T.'

It appears I'm not the only one who's not keen on them. It appears that, instead of just not being keen, some are positively fearful. Whether this is an underling, pre-existing fear, a result of the individual's dementia or a side-effect of the drugs, I'm not entirely sure.

But...

This morning, when we were led from breakfast (slop on toast - at least, I'm assuming the cardboard wedges were meant to be toast and they weren't just handing out free door stops) to the recreation room, one corner was moving.

Yes, moving.

In the bottom corner, beneath the TV and to the left of the window, a shadow shifted and shuddered. I did the same. My friend Bender Benny looked, shrugged and parked himself in his favourite chair for his after-slop snooze. A couple threw up - a bit excessive, methinks - and then someone tipped the domino.

Brenda, sweet and low with a saccharin aftertaste, screamed. Carol, a woman whose fastest speed was a shamble and was only so far into the room because she'd been swept up by the throng of residents and orderlies, took the proffered baton of hysteria and ran with it.

Like a forest wildfire, all crackles and sparks and chaos, the madness - appropriate for an asylum, you may think - spread. Butter on toast (cardboard or otherwise) it smothered everyone until the orderlies had no option (they'd tell you) other than to resort to their mini version of cattle prods.

A few good zaps later and a few good cans of ant spray and order was finally restored. It didn't take much. A mop for the vomit. A hoover for the husks of the once-active ants. A nudge to wake Benny because his favourite programme was on in a minute. Grumbles from the orderlies about not being paid enough for this aggravation - though they didn't really need to smile as they jabbed their prods.

Hours later I still scratched myself and twitched occasionally as I was sure I felt an ant crawling on my arm or neck or under my scrubs. But I didn't. It was, most probably, their ghosts.

Ants in your pants make your belly button boogie.

Ants in an asylum make the residents riot.