I just passed a cockroach on my way to the office kitchen. I’ve had encounters with roaches here before, including a particularly traumatizing incident that I previously documented on 06.13.05 in my Angry BloggerTM days. Ever since that morning, I have tried to stay as clear of the buggers as I possibly can, especially when I’ve yet to have my morning coffee. Of all the things I don’t want to do before caffeine, hearing the crunch of a chitinous exoskeleton against the sole of my favorite Docs is pretty close to the top of the list. Besides, this roach wasn’t moving, even as I side-stepped it. I figured it must have come in contact with whatever chemical that building maintenance uses whenever the roach problem becomes too pronounced. I figured it was dead.
I figured wrong. After I finished getting my coffee and making my morning oatmeal (all the while trying to suppress any images that so desperately wanted to pop into my mind of roaches licking the water spigots), I returned to my office…to get my camera. Yes, I was going to snap a photo of the dead roach to post here as a wonderful Friday treat. Yes, I know. I’m just too kind. And of course I was then going to scoop it up and toss it before any of my coworkers arrived and freaked out over it.
It wasn’t there. I know no one else picked it up, because at the time I was the only person on the floor. Just me and roaches. I looked around for it, but in a squeamishly half-assed way. Dead roaches I can contend with. Live ones? I’d much rather deal with house centipedes than roaches any day. So now there is a roach roaming near the kitchen. I should clock how long it takes before I hear the inevitable high-pitched panic that will ensue when it reappears.
