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Pest control

This morning when I was carrying my coffee from the kitchen to the office, this being my morning commute, I saw a big, shiny cockroach wandering around slowly, as if confused or merely Southern, under the dinner table. It wasn't one of the little, brown domesticated cockroaches (which I've never seen in my house, ever), but one of the black, juicy, free-range cockroaches that one sees crawling out of the manhole covers at night. I never see those in my house either, by the way; I guess this one got lost on his way home from a wild night of raiding trashcans and terrorizing small to medium-sized rodents.

Because the abatement of big, crunchy bugs is the only job my cats have, I set down my coffee and ran into the living room to grab the nearest cat, Sparky, who was taking his post-breakfast nap on the red leather chair. "Okay, Sparks, time to get to work." I set him down and pointed him at the cockroach.

Normally, he locks onto target and goes into full insect-torture mode more or less instantly, but this time he just yawned and belched a little. Since he hung around by the bug and didn't fall asleep again right away, I figured he was sort of on the case. I watched him watch the bug for a few minutes and then decided that he wasn't quite enough on the case and maybe I should do something.

I have no justification for what I did next, except that it seemed like a good idea and please remind yourself that I hadn.t had any coffee yet. I thought, if I could get the bug to walk into a bag, I could carry the bag out to the trashcan and that would solve the bug problem. So I got a bag, placed it on the floor with the open end pointing towards the bug and watched the bug turn and walk in the other direction. At this point I came to my senses, put the bag away, and took my coffee on into my office.

I'd like to point out that whenever you put a bag down in front of a cat, the cat always walks into the bag. Even if the bag is smaller than the cat's head.

Later, when I went back for more coffee, I found the cat reclining, sphinx-like, beside where the cockroach was navigating a throw rug. He was gazing benevolently down at the bug, as if it were some kind of pet, and occasionally nodding off. I looked a little more closely at the roach and noticed that it was missing a leg. Maybe Sparky was working on the bug problem, but not quickly enough to satisfy me.

You don't eat a good bug like that. Sparky blinked. Not all at once.

I'm not afraid of bugs, but I really hate the crunch and squish of smashing them, which is why I leave it to the cats, who look upon bugs as interactive sushi and like the crunch and squish. I grew concerned that if Sparky didn't get cracking, then I might accidentally step on the bug and experience the crunch-squish that I was trying to avoid. Now, with caffeine in my bloodstream, I came up with a better idea (Oz's usual method of dealing with bugs): the vacuum cleaner!

I got out the vacuum and vacuumed up the cockroach. Sparky ran away to hide under a bed because he hates the vacuum. I got more coffee.

586 words | July 30, 2005 07:18 PM | Felis Major