Well, after a flea-free household these many years, they're baaaaaack......
I think they came in on the wonderfully nice dog we dogsat earlier this summer, and waited for fine flea weather to take over while we were away. (The housesitter's health problems must have made the pet picture seem somewhat confusing, but when we got back last night I could see the problem right off.) Whatever the case, we've got flea eggs where the cats curl up to try to get away from their favorite cushy haunts, dogs scratching like mad, a cat I thought would be overfed has lost some weight..... all the signs.
I hope, actually, they're just in the house and not so much in the dogyard. I hate the thought of putting chems in their dogyard, which has never had fleas. I may move the dogyard, not a small undertaking!
So I am off to do battle. Yeah, I know how. When you rent a house that former occupants have left flea-ridden, as has been my lovely experience twice now, you learn the Awful Truth about this battle: they're everywhere. But not upstairs (where pets are not allowed), thank God!