It’s a well-known fact, said Diogenes Fernando, that mosquitoes attack your feet and ankles. But is that because they naturally prefer the low-level approach? Or because they know that your feet and ankles are the furthest point from your eyes and ears?
He was having this somewhat bizarre conversation with Aunt Harmonium in the wake of her being bitten by one of the street dogs her neighbour insisted on feeding outside his gate. She is now suing him for a multitude of alleged offences.
The mosquito question arose after she consulted Canine Confidential dog behaviourist Ms Luna Lupo, who was recommended by famed astrologer Madam Moonbeam. Ms Lupo had said that every living thing—including dogs, crows and mosquitoes—are connected to us on the astral plane. They can read our minds, she said, so beware!
Which is exactly not what a disgruntled Aunt Harmonium had wanted to hear. What kind of lunatic advice is that, she crossly asked Diogenes. I can’t take this to court, she said. The judge might think that being bitten was my own fault for not bewaring, which would be outrageous!
Diogenes is sympathetic. But what if Ms Lupo was right? Aunt Harmonium says she hit the dog with her umbrella only after it bit her. But what if she had subconsciously intended to hit the brute before it bit her, which triggered an unconscious astral-plane provocation? The dog somehow just knew?
If that’s the case, thinks Diogenes, then maybe mosquitoes also just know that the stealth approach makes perfect sense. After all, if they’re trying to sneak up and bite you, much better if you don’t see or hear them coming…
Meanwhile, he’s had a somewhat alarming Twitter jitter (@DiogenesLanka). He recently asked: ‘Did demagoguery, jobbery, robbery and snobbery cause our downfall? Are our politicians looking ahead to the past and over their shoulders at the future?’
He thought that fellow tweeters would appreciate his witty alliterations. How wrong he was. The only result was a smouldering spat with someone who accused him in no uncertain terms of ‘trying and failing dismally to be too clever by half ’.
‘You demean yourself and our country and ought to be thoroughly ashamed! As your mother should have told you, if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all!!’.
A bemused Diogenes had assumed this was merely light-hearted banter, and responded: ‘You’re so right! How about ‘our tea and spices are the best in the world, and our young women the most beautiful!!’. Good enough?
At which Diogenes seriously thought about quitting Twitter and improving his social skills by reading Jordan Peterson’s ‘12 Rules For Life’. But hell no, he decided, I’m not going to be run out of town by a raving loony!
So he simply deleted the conversation and blocked him (or is it her?). Finito. Out of sight, out of mind, bon voyage and good riddance! But as a precaution he now uses a VPN connected to Kyiv whenever he goes online. In these turbulent times, he thinks, you can’t be too careful.