Thursday, November 02, 2006

Cockroach Hysteria



Okay, we got two new fish. When Christina and I lifted off the aquarium top, we saw a dark red cockroach scatter into the filter/pump area. We were astounded with the size of this monster. I think it has been living in the aquarium top, living off the moisture and slime for 2 years. It had to be at least 2 years old!! It was just a smidgen smaller than the one at left.

since our man Dave is in India for the week, we called Willis Stebbins our 10th grade neighbor on the 13th floor to come up and help us kill it . He came and took one look at it and was floored by its size. He was not going near that thing. So we called Danny Sullivan, the buildings resident bug afficionado up to kill this thing. This is a 12 year old boy who collects scorpions, centipedes, and even had a small cockroach friend. Even he said, "Too big." So here we were; no one wanted to deal with it, but there is no way I could sleep knowing it was there. The fate of this bad boy fell in my hands. This insect was in a location where it was impossible to smash with a shoe or newspaper, the only way to get it was to manually kill it.

As we were all screaming and freaking out; I took a pair of scissors and bravely manuvered it into a position where I could wack off its head. Do you know what kind of courage this took? That cockroach could have easily run up the blade of the scissors and scattered up my arm and into my open screaming mouth!! I closed my eyes, guessed as to the location of the insect and quick as a cat, snipped that head right off.

Mercifully the body and head fell into the water where it continued to jiggle and squiggle for an obscene amount of time. Even its guts where leaching out into the water. It was so insanely gross that the fish wouldn't go near it. So Christina and Willis fished it out with the skimmer and Willis disposed of it for us. I have yet to work up the nerve to pick up the scissors and sterilize them with rubbing alchohol. I would rather deal with a rat than a cockroach. We live on the 27th floor! Our aquarium is in the office! That cockroach came with the stupid aquarium over 2 years ago from the dealer!!! AGGH!!!

3 comments:

Cari said...

Oh my gosh that freaked me out just reading about that! YOU BRAVE, BRAVE WOMAN! I HATE cockroaches! We once lived in an apartment in Cypress, CA that was infested with them. We could not get rid of them. Once Elisabeth and I were sitting on our couch watching t.v. and minding our own business and one crawled up the back of my neck! Yes, I freaked! And poor Elisabeth was scarred for life! I would get some kind of bug killer spray for situations such as this in the future. (Do they sell stuff like that there?) That is so gross! I'd get a new pair of scissors too because everytime I'd look at them I'd remember that ugly bug. So brave!

Anonymous said...

yowza! I hate being the chosen one in these situations. Like I want to kill stuff more than Jaim does? I don't think so.

Kudos to you! A new form of martial art!

Hey Jude! said...

cockroaches=gross

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