As is often the case on summer evenings, we were sitting on the porch in rockers, listening to the toads and contemplating the state of the world.
Suddenly, there were intruders. We heard the distinct whine, and then my husband was slapping his legs.
The mosquitoes had come.
Out in the garden, gnats attack. Down by the stream, the biting flies are voracious.
I hate insect repellent of any kind. It's icky. But using it is more than a matter of annoyance avoidance.
Between the West Nile virus that mosquitoes carry and Lyme disease from ticks, insect repellents are becoming a bulwark against disease.
This year, West Nile has made an early appearance. The first detection of the virus in a mosquito was in Greene County on May 17 - the earliest since testing began in 2000.
In 2010, Pennsylvania had 28 reported human cases, the most since 2003. New Jersey had 29 cases. Older people tend to be the most at risk.
In the case of the biting flies, you could almost say using insect repellent is a mental health aid.
But while slathering chemicals on your skin is a good way to keep the bugs at bay, what is it doing otherwise?
It's the same debate that arises in other domains, such as cleaning supplies: Are the products that actually work also not so good for you? And are the ones that are ostensibly safer not as effective?
"With some cosmetics, we say these are unnecessary chemicals and you can avoid them," said Sonya Lunder, senior analyst with the Environmental Working Group, a national nonprofit that is concerned about people's "body burden" of potentialy harmful chemicals.
But it's a different story with things like sunscreens and insect repellents, which often are a necessary part of being outdoors.
On its West Nile information Web page, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said two repellents have "demonstrated a higher degree of efficacy in the peer-reviewed, scientific literature" - DEET and Picaridin.
DEET is a broad-spectrum repellent used worldwide since 1957. The higher percentage of DEET a product has, the longer it works.
But it's serious stuff.
Some who use DEET, especially at high concentrations, have skin reactions. The New York state health department notes on its website that its use - mostly, ingesting it - has been associated with rare reports of slurred speech and confusion as well as seizures.
