Last night while helping a beginning tyer I picked up my bag of hackles. It is a monster Zip-Lock bag holding many cubic feet. There are dozens of capes, dozens of saddles and a number of full skins.

And there they were at the bottom of the bag, pupae!

Immediately I started tearing through everything else looking for more. Surely the hackles were not the only victim? Moth balls went everywhere because I could not know where the bugs may have crawled... and laid an egg.

Then I was worried about all the bear skin pieces I was to send out today, even though they just got here and had been through a quarantine.

This morning I decided to survey the damage in the hackle bag. I set out a clean area and started unloading the hackles carefully, cleaning each as I went. Thinking about the luck involved in the bugs hitting the bottom of the bag where less-favored hackles tend to congregate, wierd thoughts started about always standing the bag up and how I have been harping at my son to keep the big bags closed.

Finally, at the bottom of the bag, there they were, about a dozen small white grains which I carefully swept up to examine. Basmati rice!!! Someone had nailed me! I do not know who... The woman that has let me live with her these last 29 years is a redhead... With a sense of humor. I have been known to pull a dirty trick or three in my life... My son is 15 and knows I am a hacklaholic.

So many suspects... And a red-faced clown in the middle.
art, the red-faced one