On Monday...

...I will have lived in this city, and my little dungeon, for ten years. There are times when I question whether the decision I made was the correct one. On reflection, it's hardly worth the effort of contemplating. It is what it is.

When the former wife and I owned our house we were inundated with vermin. We lived across from a horse farm, out in the country, and we dealt with everything from black widows to mice. It was a nuisance, for sure, especially when you have two youngin's, but I always found a way to keep the place safe and comfy.

When I moved here to the little box I didn't anticipate any insect problems. I'm not an insect-a-phobe by any stretch. They inhabit the planet same as we. And I tend to give them their space as long as they don't infringe on mine. Live and Let Live. And considering the fact that I live on a lake I've been pretty fortunate as far as that goes. Oh, I've had the black snake on the back porch. Easily dismissed. The one October when every night I would come and find four or five spiders partying in the bedroom. Couldn't for the life of me figure out where they were coming from. Since I like to keep the sliding glass door open in the bedroom that opens to the lake I engaged my investigative skills one evening and found that they had set up a commune in the threshold and would crawl out of the little drip holes and threaten me with what they though was my arachnophobia. Silly little things. I nuked their asses and have been free ever since. OK, every once in awhile some scavenger will find his way in but it is duly disposed of.

Now, in all the years I've been here I've never had to deal with a cricket. I've never liked those SOB's since the first time I used them for bait. They're a pain in the ass to catch and I don't like shoving the hook up their ass. But the other day I came home and all I heard was this chirp-chirp-chirp. I figured it was coming from outside, so I ignored it. Until that night, when, with the sliding door closed, I heard the incessant whine. For three days I tried to track that fucker down and finally isolated it in the bathroom. So I cleaned out the cupboard. Nowhere to be found. Took apart the vent for the AC and the fart fan and sprayed some Raid. Nope. Sat in there again because for some reason those rascals know when you are in their territory. Opened the cupboards again and I swore the intensity of the chirp escalated, so I emptied it again. Nothing.

I was about to resign myself to the fact that I would have a roommate. I have no idea what they eat, but this terrorist was obviously surviving. The next day I was emptying the trash and went and grabbed the bag from the bathroom and took it to the dumpster. Low and damned behold I haven't heard a peep since then. I have no idea how in the hell it ever got in there. And it would have been the last place I looked.

Such is life in the fast lane.