Duplicitous Bugs
(Day Two)
Our bathroom is infested with ladybugs. They're not anywhere else in our house, just the bathroom. I'm assuming it's because they either like the cold tile or the high ceilings, but it might be because they have an irrepressible, suicidal urge to be washed down a shower drain. But nothing seems to stop them -- not freezing temperatures, not extra caulk on the window, not the threat of the vacuum hose.
Tonight I stood in the shower washing my hair and watching as two ladybugs crawled over the loofa in circles, wiggling the water off their little spindly legs. Forget the fact that now I could not use said loofa. The worse part was that I could not even close my eyes to wash the shampoo out, because everyone knows that as soon as you take your eyes off a bug or a spider it lunges towards your face.
(That may seem like exaggeration, but it was only a few days ago that one dive bombed my head as I brushed my hair, so don't underestimate them.)
You might be wondering why I didn't just take the shower nozzle and wash them away. I wondered that, too. That's clearly what one should do when faced with a bug in the shower, and I've done it hundreds of times in the last month. I just kept remembering one guy a week or two ago, clinging to the drain as I blasted him with water. He held on there for longer than I thought possible, until my mind started creating a Pixar film out of it: the poor, defenseless bug against the relentless spray of water led by some looming, faceless giant. Off to the side, the baby ladybug -- "No, Daddy! No! Hold on! You have to teach me life lessons and courage and standing up for what's right!" Just as I was about to ease up and let the ladybug live a few minutes more, he lost his grip and tumbled down the drain, and I did feel a small twinge of regret. Am I the villain in an animated film? Did I leave a little ladybug family fatherless?
So I let the loofa interlopers live, for now, but I watched them closely. They seemed slightly duplicitous, like maybe they were posing as kind ladybug fathers but really they wanted to eat my face, and that keeping all parts of me under the shower stream was the only thing keeping me safe. I'll give them tonight to either continue along their ladybug journey or to say goodbye to their little families.
P.S. These aren't even real ladybugs -- they're Asian lady beetles, so clearly they're deceptive.
Our bathroom is infested with ladybugs. They're not anywhere else in our house, just the bathroom. I'm assuming it's because they either like the cold tile or the high ceilings, but it might be because they have an irrepressible, suicidal urge to be washed down a shower drain. But nothing seems to stop them -- not freezing temperatures, not extra caulk on the window, not the threat of the vacuum hose.
Tonight I stood in the shower washing my hair and watching as two ladybugs crawled over the loofa in circles, wiggling the water off their little spindly legs. Forget the fact that now I could not use said loofa. The worse part was that I could not even close my eyes to wash the shampoo out, because everyone knows that as soon as you take your eyes off a bug or a spider it lunges towards your face.
(That may seem like exaggeration, but it was only a few days ago that one dive bombed my head as I brushed my hair, so don't underestimate them.)
You might be wondering why I didn't just take the shower nozzle and wash them away. I wondered that, too. That's clearly what one should do when faced with a bug in the shower, and I've done it hundreds of times in the last month. I just kept remembering one guy a week or two ago, clinging to the drain as I blasted him with water. He held on there for longer than I thought possible, until my mind started creating a Pixar film out of it: the poor, defenseless bug against the relentless spray of water led by some looming, faceless giant. Off to the side, the baby ladybug -- "No, Daddy! No! Hold on! You have to teach me life lessons and courage and standing up for what's right!" Just as I was about to ease up and let the ladybug live a few minutes more, he lost his grip and tumbled down the drain, and I did feel a small twinge of regret. Am I the villain in an animated film? Did I leave a little ladybug family fatherless?
So I let the loofa interlopers live, for now, but I watched them closely. They seemed slightly duplicitous, like maybe they were posing as kind ladybug fathers but really they wanted to eat my face, and that keeping all parts of me under the shower stream was the only thing keeping me safe. I'll give them tonight to either continue along their ladybug journey or to say goodbye to their little families.
P.S. These aren't even real ladybugs -- they're Asian lady beetles, so clearly they're deceptive.