For most of my adult life I have battled allergies. Through my childhood I was happy and healthy, but when I hit adolescence and my body and hormones started to change, my debilitating allergies began to appear. During the hottest times of the summer I can hardly even go outdoors, because of all the pollen and allergens in the air. I can also never own a cat, because pet dander makes me cough and sneeze endlessly. When I moved to a new place, I had to make sure to test the air quality of it before I signed the lease. At the time the air quality was tip-top, but by the time I moved in it was very different. What could have possibly happened in such a short amount of time to so radically change the air quality? The answer was not pretty, because it seemed that a family of squirrels had gotten into an exterior air vent and made a nest inside my house. Somewhere up in the attic, hidden deep in the pink insulation, squirrels were contaminating my indoor air quality. I called the HVAC tech I had used before and asked for some advice, and he told me to call animal control. All of the air ducts would need to be cleaned and sterilized, and he would have to check for any damage the critters might have done to the ventilation system. Before the HVAC tech could do anything I would need to get those pesky squirrels removed, because messing around with animals isn’t part of his job.