Thursday 30 July 2009

ants


there's lots of them.
and they've taken over my clothes line.
not good to bring in clean clothes with a few
additional hitchhikers of ants.
ants wandering amongst one's knickers can be somewhat unsettling.

i've encouraged the little things to move along.
and so, they've swarmed over a great expanse.
apparently one of the collective terms for these critters is a bike.
so there's a great bike of ants outside, and in dealing with such
i've managed to bring some inside with me.
hence random ants throughout the day.
one on the coaster.
one on the couch.
one tapdancing along the computer keyboard.
and then of course,
an ant or two in one's pants.
better than an entire bike in one's trousers i suppose.
(of course, i expect, you know this.)


note: they're also of course referred to as a colony, army or swarm. and they most definitely are swarming about the place.

you may also be interested (or you may be completely indifferent of course, but it's hard to tell from here) to know that the collective term for apes is a troop.

magpies, a congregation or tittering.
mallards/ducks, a flush or puddling/paddling.

an array of hedgehogs.
monkeys, a cartload, tribe or troop.
cobras, a quiver. (would make me quiver. but, even just one could do that.)

a float of crocs.
a dule of doves.
a rhumba of rattlesnakes.
a crash of rhinos.
a leap of leopards.
a swift of tigers.
a skulk of foxes.

you can have a bloat of hippopotamuses.
also quite apt is a scourge of mosquitoes.
prettily there's a bouquet of pheasants.
a peep of chickens.

a knob of.... pintails. (a type of duck it turns out. i wonder if there's a yobbo duck... could come in handy.)

a bevy or lamentation of swans.
an ostentation of peacocks.
an implausibility of gnus.
an unkindness of ravens.
a troubling of goldfish.
a smack of jellyfish.
and, a mischief of meeces.
by which, of course, i mean mouses.
no!
mice.






so next time one of your mates shows off by their great ken that a bunch of crows be a murder, you can ask them if they know what a knob refers to!