Liquid death

Every summer the black ants come. And every summer we exterminate them with an unnervingly effective product called Terro. You squirt a drop onto a piece of cardboard. The ants, heedless to everything else around them, feed for a few days. Then: no more ants.

We first used the product in summer 2002, when memories of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks were still fresh. That made Terro's trademark all the more unnerving.

At first we squirted Terro onto pieces of the box the product came in, as directed. But the box is long gone. This year I cut out squares from a mailing sent by the Spring Green, Wis. Shakespeare troupe American Players Theatre.