What is it about mos­quito bites that makes them so damn sat­is­fy­ing to scratch? It’s like a higher form of itch­ing, which turns into a higher form of scratch­ing. I’ve always had bad reac­tions to insect bites; when I was young, I had one that was almost the size of my head. It cov­ered up all of my kneecap and I decided to get med­ical help when I couldn’t walk with­out feel­ing like I had an extra 27 lay­ers of skin bunch­ing up on the joint. I know I shouldn’t touch them, and I’ve since gained the self-control, but some­thing just makes me want to jab my fin­gers in them and claw them until they bleed.