TheNoah was recently here, in Vegas, for five days, which was beyond fantastic, except that on the third evening on our way back to the house, he hopscotched into a convenience store and bought a 24-ounce can of Chelata. I would have stopped him except I was too busy being uselessly drunk in the shotgun of my car, good for nothing other than updating my Twitter account from my phone regarding just how useless I was. A lot, in case you're wondering.
And Chelata, in case you're wondering this as well, is the most useless beverage created by middle-class America. It's Clamato and Bud Light. Because it wasn't enough that someone created a beverage based on the premise of: "I really like clams and cocktail sauce, but all this chewing requires so much effort..." No, someone actually proceeded to take the next step, and voilá! Clam juice + tomato juice + crappy beer.
Anyway. He bought it and put it in my fridge and then never drank it. And then two nights later I found a giant dead roach in my kitchen: [1]
And then five minutes later saw a giant LIVE roach pacing around the baby fig tree I keep inside by the balcony door.
I screamed bloody murder (both times, actually) and leapt on top of the kitchen island and watched it move around for a good ten minutes before it disappeared into the shadows, whereupon I realized I was now trapped, because if I didn't know precisely where it was, it could be anywhere, hungry for the flesh and blood of a freaked-out 20-something girl. So I continued sitting (sometimes standing) on top of the island, gazing nervously at the floor, for another hour before I finally grabbed all my pertinent things (laptop, phone) and made a break for my bedroom upstairs.
Fourteen hours later, I finally had the courage to go back downstairs. TheNoah had chastised me the night before, saying I should just suck it up and kill the roach, but the thing is, I can't kill bugs. Usually I just trap them under a cup and put them outside (see: crickets, spiders (even fucking poisonous brown recluses) and moths), but this doesn't apply to roaches because HELLO THEY'RE ROACHES. (I've never been squeamish about rodents because we don't have rodent problems out here and also because I grew up with pet mice and a pet rat.)
It was afternoon, though, with plenty of sunshine still flooding the kitchen, so I had little expectation of seeing anything scuttling across the floor, and true enough, the only things moving across the kitchen floor were lint bunnies (the blanket that I drag between the kitchen couch and the big couch thing pills and sheds linty pieces like nobody's business).
Turns out, though, this was less because of daylight and more because of this:
I want to take a second to point out to you how difficult it was to take these pictures, by the way. I had to streeeeeeeeetch my hand over the point of interest and squint through one barely-opened eye at the screen to confirm that said point of interest was within the frame, then snap the picture and run away. When I transferred the pictures to the computer? I had to cover my face and look between my fingers. Same for uploading. Actually I haven't even uploaded the pictures at this point in writing; I'm still debating whether to put the pictures inline with this post or just put links, because frankly, I don't write often enough these days to ensure that this post will be off the front page anytime soon.
I'd also like to take a second to ponder something with you: the fuck is up with roaches committing suicide in my kitchen? Though I had my doubts about the first one for a good while; for all I know, roaches consider dishes of leftover vegetable oil to be the finest of spa treatments and that dude was just getting some R&R before leaping up to gnaw my face off. But more importantly: why are they climbing on top of the counters? It's like realizing that oh, bears can climb trees-- after you've already climbed to the top of one. Roaches climb up cabinetry? Willingly? Is there no justice in this world?
And thirdly, a second to inform you that the blue dish? Yeah it's like four feet across. Same with the plate in the sink (it's a big sink). Just so you have an idea of how big the bugs are. TheNoah didn't believe me but I swear it's true.
So the moral of this story is Chelata is the devil's hairy ball sweat and serves only to be a harbinger of evil and doom, and if you ever need an efficient tactic to scare your girlfriend into finally moving out of the house she (deeply) loves in the city she (strangely) loves and up to San Francisco instead, well, here you go.
[1] There's an argument floating around out there that the bugs came into my kitchen because I've been leaving the balcony door open (with the flimsy screen door still closed) for the last week or more and their presence has nothing to do with the bringing of the Chelata into the house. This argument is wrong.
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