I work for a small valet company in a pretty popular beach town. During the summer, I manage a private parking lot and sell parking spots to beach goers. For the last three years, I have been the only employee who runs this parking lot.
My girlfriend came over a week ago to my apartment with her dog, and just a few days ago, we noticed a flea crawling around on his stomach area. Well, over the span of a week, those fleas multiplied several times over, completely unbeknownst to me.
Well, this morning I woke up to find 25+ fleas on my legs and feet, and anywhere between 50-100 bite marks. I’ve never had any prior experience with fleas before, so in my mind this was an emergency. I washed off all of the fleas I could, but the moment I stepped onto a carpeted area (about 90% of my apartment is carpeted), I would instantly find several more fleas on my feet. I ended up calling my boss to keep him informed on the situation.
The conversation went as follows:
Me: Hey boss, I’m having a bit of an emergency right now. My entire apartment is infested with fleas right now, and I need to figure out a way to get rid of them.
Boss: Well you’re still going to have to come in to work.
Me: … okay, well can I show up around an hour after my starting time? I need to get rid of all the fleas because they’re everywhere, in my sheets, in my clothes, and all over my skin.
Boss: You shouldn’t have let it get that bad in the first place.
I was absolutely dumbfounded at this point. How was I supposed to know that there were fleas in my apartment to begin with? If I got a bug bite I would just assume there was a mosquito buzzing around somewhere and not think anything of it.
God, if my job didn’t pay so well for relatively easy work I would’ve quit on the spot.