I just went out to get my lunch, and found that the whole of Cherry Hinton is absolutely crawling with ants. There are a lot of normal-looking ants swarming around the pavements, but also the whole place is teeming with winged things which look about the right size and shape to be flying ants.
I wonder how far the swarm extends. Anyone in other bits of Cambridge noticed any unusual insect activity today?
There's a few flying ants among the horde who have clearly nested outside our doorstep. Also, there are super-large giant ants at the St. Johns Innovation Centre today. I heartily endorse Raid ant powder and loads of boiling water chucked in the general direction of the nest. :P
WRT the antses, the fount of all knowledge that is Radio 2 drivetime sa that it is, in fact, ant mating season, hence the swarms of them. I'm not sure what is worse, the unromantic thought of ants mating, or admitting to being a Radio 2 junkie...
As I arrived back from lunch someone shouted at me `watch out for the flying ants'. It struck me as odd, but if I see some flying ants I'll know what they were talking about.
Hmm. It's not obvious to me that that's a deliberate reference; Cherry Hinton is a mainly-residential suburb of Cambridge and probably has almost no fame outside it (unlike, say, London boroughs, whose names tend to be well known to many non-Londoners even if someone like me couldn't reliably locate any given one in even the right half of a map of London).
I suppose it's possible that someone trying to think up character names was inspired by noticing that the name of the town was also a plausible personal name, but it could just as easily have been coincidence, and I'd tend to doubt it was specifically intended to amuse.