A Living Text

One of the worst times of my life was when I briefly lived in North Carolina. We owned a nice townhouse on golf course, in a costal city. It seemed great until the first morning of life there when I took a shower and saw a roach crawling up the outside of my shower curtain. This was followed by roaches in the kitchen, in other bathrooms, etc. We moved from North Carolina to Michigan after four months of living there; it wasn’t just the roaches, but they didn’t help.

So I despise the thought of living in the South due to the bug factor. However, we’ve been in Virginia for three years, (I love it), and most of the weird bugs are reserved for the humid summer. Until this year that is. A month or so ago the kids found small roaches on the landing about three different times. That was it, and then it seemed to be done. Until today. When I woke up bleary eyed and confused I walked into our bathroom. As soon as I turned on the light, something black dropped from a shower curtain. I am nearly blind without my contacts, so I didn’t know for sure, but I was pretty darn sure that it was a roach. I quickly found a pair of glasses, and sure enough, it was a roach. It seems like the North Carolina roaches were a lot smarter, they would run and immediately hide, this one sat there. It was about 3/4 of an inch long, not large by scary standards, but way too large for me. 

I looked around in a panic for something to shoot it with. I know that we have no deadly chemicals (for bugs) in the room, so I tried CK One on it- nothing. I doused it with Comet. it twitched it’s feelers a little, ad sat there. I figured it was in the pile of Comet, so I could run downstairs and get something better. I ran through the hall and stopped to see a light on in my oldest’s room - (’Why is your light on??!!’ - that’s another story) I was relieved to find Raid Ant and Roach in a downstairs closet, and ran back upstairs. Now, I thought I remembered something about roaches sensing motion or waves or something, and sure enough, when I got back to the bathroom, it was gone. Now I feel like a serial killer is in the house in a bad movie - where is it? I am panicked and looking everywhere, shooting off blasts of Raid into corners. I looked for a trail of Comet to lead me to it, but I didn’t see anything. I worked up the courage to take a step into the bathroom and saw the vile thing in a corner. I then blasted it with Raid and it immediately expired. Whew - a sigh of relief…

Now, roaches in N.C. didn’t die immediately from Raid, they fought it for 20 minutes or so. Either Raid is deadlier now, or this is some weaker type of roach. Also, a NC roach would have been gone as soon as I left the bathroom and I’d have never seen it again. So that’s a positive. But suffice it to say that as I took a shower I was pondering a move to Pennsylvania.