Saturday, September 13, 2003

Can I move in with you? That’s not an ill conceived pick-up line by any stretch of the imagination, gentle reader, but a heartfelt cry for help. My studio is fully aware of how I’ve badmouthed it, you see, and it has summoned Nature itself to make me cry uncle. For a moment forget the mysterious jaw problems or the strange cut on my body inflicted by who knows what. Consider this instead.

While trying to vacuum a spider this evening I make the innocent mistake of leaving both the vacuum and the air conditioner on at the same time. Angry at my brazen decadence, the electricity promptly blinks out, necessitating a trip to the basement to reset the breakers. Same old, same old, right? Tell that to the Snickers Fun Sized BUG that hugs me at the basement threshold. So I’m jiggling my key in the basement door because the stupid lock isn’t exactly user friendly, and this loud clicking sound starts up behind me like some piss-poor marching band.

“Oh,” I think to myself, “I’ve never heard a cicada up close.”

Damn my Discovery Channel innocence, dear reader, damn it to the Lifetime Channel! I turn my head and see a big, black bug hugging the wall, clicking away like some turnstile from hell. The lock gives and I step into the basement, but not before a flash of hubris seizes me.

“Ha!” I say with my inside voice, “Try and get me now, you little f*cker.”

The bug, however, decides it doesn’t want to screw around with the door at all and launches itself off the wall.

“Oh, shit,” says my outside voice, and my inside voice chimes in, “I hope it doesn’t fly onto me.”

You can probably guess the next part because, yup, it lands right on my shorts.

“Holy f–” I say, ALL outside voice now, and then I’m cut short as I spin around and swat at the foul thing. It escapes without biting me, but I am scarred by the memory of how much the little bastard weighs.

I trip the breaker, return to my studio, and vacuum up the spider responsible for the entire affair. A happy, albeit violent ending, don’t you think? Too bad I start sneezing like nobody’s business because of frickin’ allergies from the vacuum. Hurrah! I despise that word.