Last year I moved from one city
near Los Angeles to another near Los Angeles because I have a terrible case of
the I-can’t-stay-in-one-spot-because-I-get-bored and decide constantly that a
change of scenery is necessary. I must
have gypsy blood somewhere in my family tree. Finding a rental home in southern
California that allows a giant English Mastiff with a significant drooling
problem and a special-needs cat with vengeance issues is a bit of a challenge.
I finally found a little one bedroom house located only five minutes from the
beach. The landlord didn’t mind my pets and after a ten minute application
submission, I was wire transferring the first and last month’s rent to him.
I was thrilled to finally live without
roommates and the first few days in the apartment were quite pleasant until one
day I walked into living room and saw the biggest cockroach I have ever seen in
my life on my night light. This gangster roach didn’t run away from the light,
no, he was on it. He was all over it,
throwing monster cockroach shadows on my walls. Now I understand that I am a
firm devotee when it comes to the belief that all live life is equal, except
roaches. To me, those nasty bastards are scarier than Lucifer himself and the
one that was hanging onto my night light was the Lord of all Roaches- it had
wings. It may have even introduced himself as “Gregor Samsa” and waived at me;
I’m not sure, it was all a horrifying blur of a memory. Wide eyed and terrified, I stood there in my
living room realizing that I was all alone and the only one that could stop
this mutant roach from hell was me.
I know I only stood there for a few
moments but the horrifying daydreams of that goliath roach making roach babies
who then become a gang of goliath roaches attacking me in military formation swarmed
through my head like a horrible nightmare. I could feel their thousands of tiny
feet crawling over me as I shivered in disgust.
As I stood there staring at my sworn enemy whose very existence mocked
my soul, I decided to play God. This roach had to die.
Getting out my trusty can of Raid,
I stretch my arm out as far as physically possible to maintain distance and still
be able to press the button. At first I missed but thanks to my immense amount
of practice with water guns at the fair, I was able to soak that creature down
like a bra-less woman at a wet t-shirt contest. Little did I realize that Raid
was merely a power source for this creature; it practically laughed so hard at being
splashed by Raid that it stumbled off my nightlight and on to the floor. As it fell to the ground, it turned and ran towards
my bedroom faster than any roach I have ever seen! We’re talking Bonneville
Salt Flats land speed record fast!
I had to act instantly. Grabbing
onto my broom I raced after this behemoth roach only to find it climbing up my
bed sheets like it was scaling an obstacle course rope wall.
“OH HELL NO!” I yelled my
battle-cry at the top of my lungs like a gladiator ready for war as I began to
slap the roach off of my bed with my broom; which wasn’t well a well-thought
through plan on my part because instead of this roach just falling to the
ground like normal roaches do, it took flight and attacked me. Okay well maybe
it didn’t attack me, but I screamed a blood curling scream of sheer terror and
mid-air bitch-slapped this beast with my broom. This action got it to the
ground where I repeatedly slapped it with my broom and when that didn’t stop
it, I pinned it down with the bristles took off my shoe and started pounding
everywhere I thought that there may be hidden roach parts, but to no avail.
“Why wont you die?!” I cried out in
frustration. Luckily for me beating the bristles with my shoe slowed it down
enough to sweep it out of my front door like a hockey slap shot. Even though it
was slower, the roach kept trying to run back into my house and I transformed
from wing to goalie and played defense. Luckily a savior in the form of my
neighbor (whom I had not had the pleasure of meeting yet) who ran over to me
and asked me if I was okay.
“I heard you screaming, did
something happen?” He asked in concern.
“It’s not dying.” I reply while
pointing to the giant roach right outside my door.
This caused my neighbor to laugh.
Apparently when he had heard me scream, he thought I was being brutally
attacked and considering how old he was, it took him a moment to be able to
move his arthritic body as fast as he could over to my house for the rescue.
“I was ready to get my gun when I
heard you.” He mumbled as he leaned over, took a large rock from the gravel
pavement and crushed half of the roach’s body under it. In shock and absolute
astonishment, despite half of its body crushed to a messy pulp by a rock, the
roach still was dragging its body across the cement like a zombie towards my
apartment. I wished he had gotten his gun.
“Please get rid of it.” I pleaded
while looking down at this mutant creature and crept back into my house with
chills running down my spine. Needless to say, even though I haven’t seen a
giant cockroach since then, but the image of that roach has been burned into my
head.
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