If, at any point during my 37 years on this planet you had offered me a wager regarding whether or not a normal, everyday, weeknight dinner might one day be interrupted with the announcement that our ants had finally arrived from Uncle Milton via US Postal Service, I would have bet my car, my house, and probably my firstborn against it.

I was reminded again last night exactly why I don’t make bets unless the stakes are largely inconsequential. Dinner became jubilant chaos with the realization that our ants, yes, our live ants, had indeed been delivered.

Why are we receiving live ants in the mail from someone with the rather dubious moniker “Uncle Milton”? Well, the story goes like this: my second son, whom we have nicknamed Sanford (for reasons I will explain at a later date), received a National Geographic Ant Farm as a gift for his birthday in December.

As he is a typical six year-old boy, with typical six year-old enthusiasm, his excitement about this gift was, needless to say, boundless. In fact, he was so excited that he wasn’t even put off by the fact that the box contained no actual ants, but rather a mail-in voucher for them. He was, however, not happy about the fact that he got the gift on a Sunday and had to wait one entire, excruciating day before the voucher was safely on its way to be traded for a colony of insects.

Worse than that one day, though, was the actual waiting for the ants. Waiting, and waiting, and more waiting; waiting that seemed very much like the phrase, “through night and day and in and out of weeks and almost over a year”. By the beginning of February, the Puddinette and I were actively wondering if Sanford’s ants were every going to arrive.

Interesting piece of trivia for you: the National Geographic Ant Farm Gel Colony is actually a rebranded version of the Uncle Milton Ant Farm Gel Colony. Why is that relevant? It’s important because getting an email about live animals from National Geographic is not overly alarming. However, receiving an email bearing the subject “Uncle Milton Creature Order Status Notification” is enough to give anyone a moment’s pause. The likelihood of finding a truly disturbing message within (potentially, with pictures!) is well beyond most people’s comfort level.

The Puddinette received a message with that exact subject at the end of January; she nearly deleted the thing without even viewing it. Luckily, as she is a smart girl, she put one and one together and got ants. Thus, at the risk of compromising the health of my home network as well as having surprise images burned directly into her retinas, she opened the email. I suspect she might have built one of those reverse viewer things you use for watching eclipses in elementary school so you don’t go blind.

At any rate, it turns out that Uncle Milton isn’t a pervert but rather is the company that ships the ants for the ant colony. The email indicated that, as it was winter, and we live in a place where winter is cold, even potentially freezing, we were S.O.L. on getting any ants before spring. Yes, that’s right, Uncle Milton so deeply cares for their ant colonies that they won’t ship them during winter.

Just to be clear: I know at least two people who bought AKC-registered puppies from out of state breeders in February, and both of them were delivered. My son’s ants, though? Well, I’m afraid those little things are too dainty for such travel. Maybe in the spring, we’ll see what the groundhog says.

Last night, exactly three days into spring, I noticed a manila envelope in the mail stack stamped proudly with the name Uncle Milton. Inside we found a sealed plastic tube containing a picnic’s worth of red ants. Not tiny black household ants, mind you, no sir, we’re talking large red, mean-looking Texas-style ants. Included was a short note: “Warning, ants will bite”. Of course they will.

Long story short, we waited all winter for Uncle Milton to finally deem environmental conditions safe and adequate for the transport and delivery of a colony of red, biting ants whom I’ve been instructed not to make angry. My children were and are elated. As far as gifts go, with the happiness of my children in mind, the Ant Colony is clearly one of the best ones ever. Still, I’m wondering if I could trade it for one of those puppies that can survive winter travel. At least I can train them not to bite.

pud’n