If not, do you have any big scary bug stories?

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

Answers

Funny you should ask.

One day last week, after my 20 minute urban hike from the bus stop, I squeezed into the elevator at work with one of my coworkers and a bunch of strangers. Halfway through our slow journey to the top floor, my coworker informed me that there was a bug on my shoulder. As I reached over to brush it off, my coworker was also attempting to rid me of the creature, and our co-ordinated efforts managed to not only knock the bug off my shoulder, but down my shirt and, indeed, into my bra.

All under the watchful eye of my fellow elevator passengers. So there we stood, staring into my cleavage. Finally I looked around at the other elevator riders and announced that I would take care of the situation later. They were unmoved by this declaration. Apparently it was less interesting to listen to me talk than it was to look at my chest.

Arriving at my desk a few minutes later, I freed the bug from the confines of my bra. Seemingly unscathed, he wandered off as though nothing had happened.

Of course, this was a cute little lady bug sized beetle with yellow spots. Nothing like the monsters Beth & Viv have been dealing with. -Christine

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

BIG SCARY BUG STORY #35

This happened years ago, when I was just a boy on one of the camping trips my sister and her husband would take me on, into the wilderness of Northern Ontario and the Canadian Shield.

I was rather fond of pranks, as you'd expect with an 8-year old boy, and one of my favorites was planting lifelike plastic bugs around my sister, whose arachnaphobia and general insect-phobia is truly stunning. I had, just recently, gotten my hands on a trove of quite nasty-looking spiders and beetles, which had been turning up on my sister's dinner plate and in her drawers; you could always tell when she'd found one by the scream -- a long, multi-syllabic shriek that turned into a wail as it went up in volume, then subsided in a blubbering glossolalia.

I was sitting in my pup tent in Six Mile Lake National Park, reading and wasting time while my sister and her husband were off buying supplies or something. Feeling a bit tired, I put down my book and leaned back onto my sleeping bag to stretch. Turning my head, I saw, perched on a piece of luggage directly next to me, a curled-up coil of rubbery brown-black insect-like shape. I marvelled for a moment at its realistic texture and colour, and wondered where Lou (my brother-in-law) had found it, casting my mind to the bait shops and the wonderful lures we would constantly browse on these vacations. It was a marvellous specimen -- 10 inches long, at least, when uncoiled, I thought. I had to hand it to Lou -- nice prank, if I were scared of insects.

Needless to say, like any 8-year-old boy, my first instinct was to bit on the rubber insect, to test its consistency with the edge of my teeth -- until a certain age, there are few sensations more satisfying that the slight but firm give of rubber between your jaws. As I pulled the coiled millipede away from my mouth, I saw that its head had pulled free of the tight coil, and was twisting around in an agitated manner, little legs moving in synchronized waves beneath its curved armour plating.

I shrieked and threw it down, running out of the pup tent screaming. By the time my sister and brother-in-law came back, I couldn't find it anymore, and when I told Lou the story, he began laughing uproariously. Mary just shuddered and turned pale.

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

One weekend when Eric was out of town I was cleaning my bathroom when I noticed a very large roach in the tub. I did the all-important girl screech and then grabbed my cat Taylor and tossed him in the tub.

"KILL, Taylor! KILL!" I was chanting at him. "KILL!"

Taylor turned his grey fuzzy head up to me, gave a little smirk and said, "You've gotta be fucking kidding me. Look at the size of that thing."

And then he tried to jump over the side. The only thing that saves me is my cat doesn't know how to jump out of the tub. It's large and round and he can't figure out how to jump from the middle to the ledge. I grabbed the other cat, Lillith and dumped her in the tub as well.

"KILL, Lillith! KILL!"

"Mew?"

The roach moved towards my cats. My thirteen pound Taylor jumped into the arms of nine pound Lillith and squealed. They both looked at me and said, "Now, what have we ever done to you to cause you to torture us this way. Get us out of here now!"

I picked them both up, called them pussies and turned on the shower. I moved the shower head around and tried to drown the roach. It was too big to go down the drain, so it just floated on its back and did this backstroke kind of thing.

I grabbed Taylor again (since he can't jump out) and threw him in the tub again.

"Great! Now I'm all wet and this roach is still trying to kill me! Look, you can have whatever you want. You want my Pounce? Take the pounce. Take the Nine Lives. Take it all. Just get me out of here, please!"

worthless. completely worthless. I had to go and put on my big platform shoes, jump in the tub and smoosh the bug into little bits and then turn on the shower, wash away all bug parts and then leave my shoes outside for three weeks to completely remove all traces of the insect.

Roaches. I hate 'em.

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

Allow me to say, "Ewwwwwww."

I should have known there would be more bug stories than accomplishment stories. Anyone accomplish anything bug-related?

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

I moved from Rhode Island to Alabama three years ago, and might I say, there are some scary-ass bugs down here. Bug story #1: My daughter, who is 10, had left her sneakers in the garage overnight. The next morning, she came to me and said "There's a spider in my shoe." Being the Mommy, I have learned to take care of these things. I picked up her shoe and looked at the inside. There was nothing. Obviously the spider had crawled up into the toe of the shoe. I turned the shoe upside down and shook it, then took another look. As I turned the shoe over, a HUGE cave cricket flew out onto my neck. My daughter watched as I danced a wild jig, screaming and flailing my arms about, and at some point the cave cricket jumped off, seeking calmer pastures. Bug story #2: I walked out the back door of my house yesterday afternoon and there, at the bottom of the steps, lay a HUGE dead black widow. The scary thing was wondering where it came from, since we'd been outside poking all around our back patio and moving big bags of potting soil the day before. *shudder*

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

ACCOMPLISHMENT!

Not to break up the big, scary bug stories or anything but after a shameful amount of procrastinating, I FILED OUR INCOME TAXES TODAY and damn it I just had to share. If it counts, husband Steve has been "bugging" me about it for months.

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

I was recently down in the southern states of Arkansas, Mississippi and Alabama where I was reminded of the size of the mosquitos. At a truck stop in the dead of night somewhere humid we stopped for a snack break and gas. Using the restroom I had to kill six 'squitos before I could even sit down. When I left the restroom I had to walk through a CLOUD of 'squiters the size of a quarter. I ran towards the trucks screaming, "Open the door, open the door" and flailing at my head and legs. Once in the truck my husband and I began furiously batting at the ones that had made it in.

When I was a kid living in Mississippi I used to walk around my neighborhood at night, shooting rubber bands at mosquitos and snapping them dead. It probably speaks less of my skill and more of their size.

Now, I have the crawlies from all these bug stories.

Oh -- happy birthday, Beth!

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

Oh my God, yes! When I worked for the California Department of Pesticide Regulation, in the old Department of Food and Agriculture building (fondly known as "Food & Gag"), one of our female environmental research scientists (and a Ph.D) went into a stall to, well, you know, pee (yeah, even doctor-scientist types pee!). She came out shrieking, "Sue, you have to go in there and see this thing!" It was a five-inch German brown cockroach, on the rim of the toilet under the seat. She felt it tickle the backs of her thighs as she sat down. I remember thinking, "I'm glad I didn't sit on that thing..."

Sunshyn Sunshyn's Daydreams - yet another online journal - sigh http://members.xoom.com/sunshyndream

-- Anonymous, July 20, 1999

Ha. Bugs. Yech.

Our old apartment was infested with these fuzzy centipede critters [personally, I think they were some sort of bug that had been mutated in the big TMI scare several years back]. The cats would watch them scurry about, but never expressed any interest in hunting them down and killing them.

One day I was walking down our hallway and had stopped to speak to Dutch. As I was jabbering away, I felt something plop on my head. Saying I freaked would be an understatement. I bounced around, shaking my head as I tried to dislodge the critter. It finally lost it's hold on my hair, only to brush past my lips as it fell to the floor. Ugh. It still makes me shiver with disgust to think about that.

Happily, in our new apartment we no longer have to deal with those freaks of nature. Now all we have to do is get the cats interested in chasing down the centipedes and milipedes.

later - deb

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

OH GAWD!! I hate bugs!

Three years ago, my husband and I were lying in bed, talking. Now, like I said I really hate bugs so when I felt a little tickle on my leg I thought I was being my usual paronoid self and dismissed it.

That was a very stupid thing to do.

Feeling the tickle on my ARM now, I said to my hubby "It feels like something is crawling on me" and pulled my arm out of the covers to see IN THE DARK a HUGE BLACK WATERBUG ON MY SKIN! You never saw a human being jump so high or screech so loud. The hubby killed the bug but I refused to sleep in the bedroom for two weeks after that and I only slept with the LIGHT ON when I slept at all. My husband stripped the bed and bug bombed the room while I sat there crying and shaking with fear and disgust.

Sorry this is not an accomplishment -- I am too much of a wimp. Therapy much?

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

I have a big accomplishment that I'm pretty proud of! I survived the Warped Tour mosh pit! Sure, that may not sound like anything spectacular to the general population who are probably thinking that it's a stupid violent punk rockin generation-x fad, but it was my first time; for not knowing what to expect or what was going to happen, I did great! I stayed on my feet, I didn't get punched or kicked or grabbed, all my clothes stayed on and I had a great load of fun. I survived and I'm damn proud!

When I was a bit younger I was out in my backyard swinging on my rope swing and I hadn't realized that this big huge hairy caterpillar had fallen out of the tree and onto my shirt. Now, I'm normally NOT afraid of caterpillars as they are harmless but this sucker was enormous! I looked down and it picked its head up and wiggled his hairy little antler stubs (or whatever) at me and he was just too ugly. I shrieked and went to flick it off of me only to find out he took this massive poop on me and it was this big yellow glob of bug doodie! So, not only did this ugly thing send me into mass hysteria but also stained my favorite tee-shirt. I can't forget that, I don't know why....

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

I can't find the "Plug Your Own Website" link, so I put it in here. Warning: my website is entirely dog related!

http://www3.sympatico.ca/capdvm

Let me know what you think if you are so inclined. And be mean....I didn't do it, I'm just paying for it! :-)

-- Anonymous, March 12, 2000

Accomplishment: after lots of long, serious talks, I finally convinced my 13-year-old son that it's a good thing to devote a reasonable amount of time and effort to his homework. It's even a good thing to ask for help when you hit a snag along the way. And you know what? His grades have improved tremendously because of it!

Besides, a little brushing up on foreign languages wasn't too bad for me either.....

-- Anonymous, March 13, 2000

I finally got my journal up and running www.dragonflyworks.com

Does that count?

-- Anonymous, February 27, 2001

Geeezus cripes Cathy - took ya long a freakin' nuff!

-- Anonymous, February 27, 2001