I finally solved my Fruit Fly problem. I would normally be rejoicing, but I'll need to wait for the experience to be a little less ripe first. BTW, do not read farther if you're faint of stomach.
I'm making a brownie pudding-cake thing for my roommate's B-Day, and I needed a small 9x9 glass pan that I'd misplaced when I moved in. I was poking around in the cabinets for it, and found it squirreled away in a low sink-side cabinet- but for some reason it was sitting in a strange, thick, brown-black liquid. I picked it up, and followed the pool back to the dark area at the back of the cupboard, and to a sagging plastic bag of.... something.
It was at that point that the smell hit me. It was like raw sewage, dirt, and spoiled meat. Fused to the wood of the cupboard was a bag of potatoes... or what had allegedly been potatoes a year or so ago. Apparently, the last tenants had forgotten that they were shoved back there, and I'd failed to notice them when I moved in. There they sat, sprouting eyes, molding, and rotting, over the course of the last year or more. They'd near-completely liquified... and soon after fruit flies got into the house, they set up a large breeding population in and around the bag. What had been buzzing around my apartment was merely the tip of the iceberg.
I chucked the bag immediately, but in the split second that I saw the contents... ugh. The contents of the bag were many things, and potatoes was not one of them. I grabbed yellow cleaning gloves and some bleach, and went to town... but the shear number of maggots and molds and horrible fungal flora almost got to me. And the smell... oh god. It filled the kitchen, and put me off any thoughts of making desert.
Broody's cake will have to wait. I first need to rediscover my desire to eat anything ever again.