Sometime in March, 1999. 3:36 p.m.

A few hours downriver from Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil.

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There I was.

Sitting on a stool having my usual after-school snack of Green-Land Campo Verde powdered milk,

when the army ants attacked. Unaware of their presence I happily snacked until

BOOM

said the battering ram, then I knew, and

BOOM

and

BOOM

and down went the front door and in marched the army ants.

The first wave perished in a choking cloud of spilled powdered milk as I leapt back from the stool, spoon in hand and ready to smash some antface.

A wolf spider howled in pain behind me.

I spun around to see an elite squad of soldier ants roughing the guy up beneath the hutch. A dozen other squads were already fanned out through the living room, dining room, hallway, putting bugs and bits of cracker to the sword.

I should’ve known they’d send special forces in the back.

Normally I’d have given aid to any insect in duress, not counting the time I immolated a rather large one with rubbing alcohol and a match for terrifying me in the shower, but these were not normal circumstances.

Surrounded, I had no choice but to save myself.

So out went the wolf spider’s lights and straight through the nearest window stuntjumped I, the screen weak enough to rend like rotted cloth and let me pass, but not so weak as to prevent the tearing out of trim and chunks of plaster. It is very important to have these chunks of plaster exploding around me as I blast my way through the window, because—

3:38 p.m.

—Wait. There is no camera crew out here.

Where are all the cameras?

Did I just make a dramatic exit and somehow turn an imminent case of compound-fractured crashlanding and emergency rooming into a graceful parkour roll for no reason?

I looked around the side yard, annoyed by the inconvenient timing of the ants’ attack but more annoyed about being sixteen and still unfamous.

The army’s main force had not advanced in stealth. From the porch to the edge of the jungle was a swath of general destruction, fireant piles ablaze, headless vipers, all manner of R-rated whatnot clearly marking the army ants' warpath. Over at treeline an armadillo hung by the neck from a tea vine. Here and there I saw grass shredded like confetti, hibiscus flowers hacked up and scattered to the wind, everything you could ever want for shooting a great action scene with the next teenage superstar, me, leaping through a window at the last minute as a hundred thousand raving mad ants overran the building.

Nuts!

Eciton burchellii, i.e., ants of the sort that had invaded my home, are the Vikings of the insect world. Unlike the Vikings of the human world, they show no mercy and answer to no gods. When they're in nomadic phase and launching raids every day, everything in their path armadillo-size and down will die. I’m explaining this in case someone doesn’t know what army ants are, because not everyone is lucky enough to grow up in a place where ants occasionally invade your home and take whatever they want.

Army ants build bridges over water with their own bodies, sacrificing themselves to get from point A to point B. Individual ants might drown, but the nest doesn’t die. This is why there were no army ants on Noah's ark. The ants heard the flood was coming, and like the rest of life on land they just laughed. Unlike the rest of life on land, they survived.

BOOM.

I looked back at the house,

BOOM,

now in full get-plundered mode and—

3:42 p.m.

—Mabel came crashing through the wall, a .12-gauge in one hand and a bloodspattered bat in the other.

“THEY BETTER GET THAT GODDAMN GECKO THIS TIME,” she screamed, ripping shards of brick out of her hair. “FUCK THAT GUY FOR SHITTING IN THE PEANUT BUTTER AGAIN!”

“I'M SURE THEY'VE SHOT HIM DOWN BY NOW,” I screamed back. “WHY DIDN'T YOU USE THE WINDOW? PROBABLY WOULDA HURT LESS.”

Mabel looked at me. Took a drag off the smoking shotgun.

“YOU THINK YOU'RE THE ONLY ONE LOOKING TO MAKE A SCENE AND GET NOTICED?”

“NO,” I screamed.

“SO THEN,” she screamed. “WHERE ARE ALL THE CAMERAS?”

“NOBODY CARES ABOUT RUNNING THROUGH BRICK WALLS ANYMORE!” I screamed. “JUMPING THROUGH WINDOWS IS WHAT'S COOL NOW!”

“THAT'S NOT TRUE! AND THE PROS USE GLASS WINDOWS, DUMMY!”

“WE DON'T HAVE ANY GLASS WINDOWS!”

“GUESS WE'LL NEVER BE SEEING YOUR DUMB FACE IN THE MOVIES, THEN!”

Out through the house’s new Mabel-size escape hatch scurried mom’s homemade meatloaf with a small detachment of army ants beneath it. Dolly followed on the backs of a larger detachment.

Dolly was a good dog but she did fall a bit short in the smarts department. A lot of the dumb came from her old man, a jolly chap of vacant gaze who'd chase a softball for ten seconds in full sprint before realizing you'd only fake-thrown it. Then he'd sprint back to you. And repeat the process all day, or until you threw your arm out. He also ate mud.

But we weren't concerned about Dolly. The last time the army ants took her, she dragged herself back home barely a fortnight later with nothing more than a broken jaw and a shaved head, sporting a couple Amazonian rune tattoos, although we did have to pull worms the size of our thumbs out of—

3:43 p.m.

—Davey dove off the roof and into the kiddie pool.

“THEY'VE TAKEN THE KITCHEN,” he screamed. “WHERE'S THE CAMERA CREW!? THAT WAS PERFECT FORM!”

Still no cameras, but it didn’t matter because Davey was not the next teenage superstar. I was. Not Davey or Mabel, me.

“I HAD TO CLIMB UP THE CABINETS AND CRAWL OUT THE ATTIC,” he continued, still screaming. Why is everyone always screaming in this story?

“ALL I HAD TIME TO GRAB WAS THE PEANUT BUTTER,” he screamed, clutching the somehow still dry bucket of oily glop said gecko’d dropped a turd in from the rafters above our dining table, which was now presumably decked with the ants’ spoils of war and ready for a victory feast.

Peanut butter, i.e., the kind that comes in buckets, was the cheapest kind available and that’s why we had it. When you bought it the bucket’s bottom half was always a brick and the top half was always a lake of oil. Even after enduring the hourlong effort of mixing this into consistency, you’d still see separation at times. Messy enough without the unwanted additives.

He offered the bucket to me.

“THANKS BUT NO,” I screamed, “AND HOW IN THE WORLD ARE YOU NOT SEVERELY—

3:46 p.m.

—BOOM.

Mabel shot the bucket out of Davey’s hand. “BULL'S EYE!” she screamed.

“ARE YOU NUTS!?” Davey screamed, Davey’s subconscious revealing by way of this very subtle pun that conscious Davey was actually in a pretty decent mood.

“YOU'RE NUTS FOR BRINGING THAT CONTAMINATED PEANUT BUTTER INSTEAD OF SOMETHING EDIBLE!”

“I HAD NO TIME!”

“NO TIME, SCHMO SCHMIME!”

BOOM.

Mabel shot the bucket again. “YOU COULDA GOT THE POWDERED MILK! THAT'S LITERALLY RIGHT NEXT TO THE PEANUT BUTTER!” she screamed.

I didn’t say anything about the powdered milk.

“STOP SHOOTING!” Davey screamed, the fear in his voice clearly an affectation meant to impress any camera crews that might be hiding in the jungle secretly filming us. I wasn’t convinced. He needs more practice.

BOOM.

That’s when Davey peed his pants and they both started yelling about peanut butter and powdered milk and guns, and instead of doing something useful like maybe tracing the swath of general destruction back to the army ants’ nest and shooting that, there they were arguing about peanut butter and that’s about the time you showed up. Also, it’s not my fault there’s a hole in the side of the house, and—

5:15 p.m.

—“Something tells me you’re lying.”

“NO, THIS IS ALL TRUE.”

“You said Mabel ran through a brick wall? That’s not possible.”

“I BROKE THE WINDOW BUT THE WALL IS MABEL'S FAULT. AND THERE REALLY WERE ARMY ANTS HERE.”

“I don’t doubt there were army ants here. I just put on my running shoes and not a single scorpion.”

“I TOLD YOU.”

“And I can see the swath of general destruction pretty clear from here.”

“RIGHT.”

“You haven’t been watching those DVDs I said were off-limits, have you?”

“NO.”

“You’re not telling me the whole truth. I can tell. We’ll talk more after my run, young man. You can expect extra work detail on Saturday.”

“NUTS!”

“That’s enough screaming, young man.”

“Nuts.”

Lies, ie., facts of the alternative sort, are—

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_{This has been a @comedyopenmic experience with @brandt. I'm not sorry for how terrible it was. I nominate @dreemit and @ginnyannette for the next round of COM.}

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_{Hello from the high Rockies of Colorado. My name is Brandt, pleased to meet you. I live in a little ghost town called Leadville. If you like mountains, snow, jokes, army ants, running, hiking, breathing, not working, etc., etc., then you and I have a lot in common. We should chat sometime. Yes, all photos are mine unless otherwise noted. Outstanding: my entire Steemit archive. Even more outstanding: funny postcards for sale. So incredible: my website. Jesus Christ, @brandt's signature is so fucking long and stupid, he should end it soon. The end. Thanks for stopping by, and have a lovely day.}