I Know this Pegs Me as a Pessimist, but I Can’t Think of One Situation Where More Cockroaches Might Actually Enhance My Life
Yesterday I realized that dead cockroaches in the house are the perfect metaphor for my life and got to experience my heart leaping as it always does when I discover a perfect metaphor while it simultaneously plummeted in disgust – a not uncommon reaction when contemplating dead cockroaches in the house.
This emotional paradox was precipitated by my encounter with a dead cockroach in the living room yesterday. Actually, it was not completely dead, just nearly dead (a stage of expiration which I find highly amusing in The Princess Bride and Spamalot, but is much less laughable when I’ve grabbed an entire roll of paper towels to pick up a cockroach and he vehemently begins to protest from his prone position with legs waving violently in the air and somehow manages to wedge himself into the perfect position in our plumbing to clog up the toilet which I used to dispose of him – although I might grudgingly admit that the roll of paper towels that encased him might have contributed to that situation.)
Anyway, this reminded me of what the pest control dude told me a few weeks ago when I called him to take care of this exact problem – the regular sighting of upended arthropods within our abode.
“I’m going to put out some poison around the perimeter of the house. In the next couple of weeks, you’ll probably find some more dead cockroaches in here,” he informed me.
“So, let me get this straight. I called you because I keep finding dead cockroaches, and you are telling me that your solution is to give me more dead cockroaches?”
“But they’re dead. Dead is good.”
“No, dead outside is good. Dead inside is a problem. And dead insect corpses littering my floor and crunching every time I walk is a bigger problem that will result in me relocating to the mental hospital – and probably canceling your contract.”
Of course I didn’t say the last part. That’s whatimeant2say. But I knew the results of prolonging the conversation…
“You’re lucky you have dead cockroaches. Some people live in huts with live ones crawling all over the place, spreading disease and laying eggs in their ears.”
To which I would reply, “Some people go their whole lives without seeing a cockroach. Some people have other people who work for them and never try to persuade them that more cockroach cadavers is actually an improvement to their living conditions.”
Why can’t I be those “some people” just once? Why do I always have to be the in-between “some people” who don’t have it great, but could have it a whole lot worse?
Just once, I would like someone to say, “Everyone has it worse than you. There is no better-than-this.” Just once I would like to be the happy cockroach, racing freely through an open field without a care in the world, instead of the somewhat dead cockroach counting his blessings that he hasn’t been flattened by a shoe – his last comforting thought as he is flushed down the toilet.
I forgot to take a picture of the cockroach, so I decided to give you a picture of Wonderbutt sniffing (or getting ready to eat – depending on your perspective) my husband’s prize Amaryllis instead. You’re welcome.
Posted on April 23, 2013, in Annoyances, Humor and tagged cockroach, humor, life, paper towels that clog up the toilet while flushing a semi-dead cockroach pretty much sums up my life, pessimist, pest control, Princess Bride, random, Spamalot. Bookmark the permalink. 17 Comments.
whatimeant2say 
I went almost crazy the other day because of a FLY buzzing around me while I tried to clean the kitchen…my goodness, I even screamed at it: why were you put on earth? why you damn thing… give me a good reason and I’ll stop screaming and waving my hands and splashing suds and dripping water all over my kitchen floor…aaaarrrggghhh…I was so angry at the damn fly for robbing me of my peaceful dishwashing time that I stopped, and WROTE A HATE POEM/ODE to the fly… I was so angry it even rhymes… I f&^((^^^%g hate flies, cockroaches aren’t that far behind but I don’t get many of them, flies thrive in my neighborhood, there’s a milk “factory” (it’s not a factory but you know what i mean) near my house and apparently flies also bother the cows there…
I hope and pray that no one ever says to you that this is the best it gets and everyone has it worse than you.
Because then you’ll feel guilty about that too.
(It would be a very funny blog post though…)
1. Wonderbutt & the Cap’n’s prize Amaryllis are much more photogenic tun any cockroach.
2. In Australia, we have GIANT FLYING cockroaches. See, we have it worse. (Once when I was on the phone to a girlfriend, one flew down my top. True story)
3. Bella eats flies but won’t go near cockroaches
4 You have my sympathy
tun? that’s predictive text for ‘than’
I’m loving this description of cockroach encounter. They are creepy things that raise the alarm in my gut. I know, I know, in comparison to me they are quite small, but so is that little tree frog that resides on some continent and is poisonous.
Still laughing at the image of a beat up cockroach battling his way out of a paper towel shroud before going for his final swim.
Made my day. Thanks for sharing.
I find earwigs in the showers in my dorm. And I found a blue bottle of beer hidden up high in the stairwell. I don’t think the RAs have noticed yet.
“There’s a big difference between slightly dead and all dead.” Or something like that.
if there’s a roach in the house, my girls will run for their lives 😉
Existing like a somewhat dead, but not entirely dead, cockroach sounds exhausting–wanting, but also not wanting, that shoe to smush you:(
Someone suggested I start a colony of cockroaches (non-native) to feed my reptiles. I politely decline. I don’t mind handling someone else’s hissing cockroaches. They are fun and endearing. But not in my house. Not ever in my house.
“Upended arthropods” – *snork!* I have no idea why, but I find that phrase ridiculously funny.
And my biggest fear is that someday I’ll be told “there is no better-than-this”. I just hope the circumstances don’t involve deceased cockroaches.
We have cockroaches around here in southern Minnesota, but I’ve never seen one. Sorry. I’m one of “those people” – but we have boxelder bugs in our house – enough that, if I chose, I could probably make a lovely red and black carpet out of them, all dried and glued together. I don’t chose, as it happens, but…just saying.
Ugh…. Cockroaches are the worst! I have the exact same reaction to them. And if you don’t feel all that fortunate to be finding dead ones throughout your house, who could blame you! Maybe you can teach WB to dispose of the little buggers outside? Cobalt has become my resident spider-killer, thank goodness!
It is fine with us you didn’t take a picture of the cockroach and post of it. We would much rather see Wonderbutt. We sure hope he didn’t eat your husband’s prize Amaryllis. It is beautiful! Hugs and nose kisses
Thank you for not taking a picture of the bug. I’d much rather see WB contemplating a flower. Bugs – alive, dead, or half and half give me the heebie-jeebies. That being said, I live in the House of Spiders, so welcome to my world. It could be worse…..
Ewww, I would die a thousand deaths. Actually we had a very healthy one once about three years ago in the kitchen and I FLIPPED out. Jason got rid of it and then I had this sinking feeling that we would find many more, because whoever says they have one cockroach problem. But we have never seen another one again. Now we have these little worms everytime we turn around, but I don’t mind them.
dead roaches have given me the best laughs of my life, not to the other person at home tho. I like to chase him with a roach around the house.
my favorite line: “everyone has it worse than you. there is no better-than-this.” i’m still waiting for that.