In my early teens, the family went away for what was to be a pleasant week-long stay in a caravan in Lochgoilhead, in the west of Scotland.
We arrived midday to find beautiful scenery next to a stunning loch, with barely a sound of civilisation to be heard beyond the caravan site.
Then early evening arrived, along with the midges. I've never known terror like it. Even the dog refused to go outside. The swarms descended on the lochside in a cloud so thick you could barely see 100 yards. They discovered every nook and cranny that could get them into the caravan. If you killed one, three more would spring up in it's place.
Despite sprays, HazMat suits and all the latest 1980's hi-tech, we discovered that the only thing that kept them at bay was my dad's pipe smoke. It's possibly the only time in history that kids have begged their parent to smoke more as they clung on to his torso for dear life.
We lasted just two nights in Lochgoilhead before heading for home covered in antihistamine cream.
Midges are the wildlife equivalent of Weapons of Mass Destruction. Indeed, instead of spending all that money on Trident, the government should take all of our enemies to Argyll for a night and then threaten to unleash the midge on their country if they even think about threatening us. Ahmadinejad would be a member of Greenpeace before you could blink.
Rather than fight back against the midge, we've now developed the tactic of running away, and that seems to be the idea behind a new iPhone App. Identify where the midges are, and stay away. It'll do sod-all for the tourist industry of Scotland, but at least we'll be spared the yearly ritual of finding children's skeletons picked clean, lying where they were abandoned by their parents during the family holiday the month before.
(Incidentally, how many times did you scratch while reading this?)
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