Home Invasion Story

 High detail closeup of a cockroach. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

       I had a post ready to go for today, but then I decided to hold off on putting it up on my blog.  My reasoning goes along with some of my previous posts that spoke about political correctness and avoiding controversy that might work against what I'm trying to achieve with Tossing It Out.  This blog is certainly no stranger to controversy, but sometimes it can be better to let things stew in the pot a while longer.   For now I'm going to turn the heat down on my intended controversy and put that pot on the back burner.   Instead, managing to still stay with the theme of my upcoming Battle of the Bands, I will present something that is more allegorical than overt.

The Cockroach Invasion

      A year or two after moving to our house in East Tennessee we were faced with a highly unpleasant situation.   Cockroaches had been sighted in our kitchen.   In all of my 16 years of living I had never seen a cockroach.  To my mind they were almost mythical--something one might see in a cartoon or hear about in urban slum dwellings.  Yet now they were here in our home.   We were all horrified by this discovery.

      At first the sightings were random and few.  We killed as many as we could see and thought this would win the battle.  However one night after returning from a family outing we turned on the kitchen lights to face hundreds of the dreadful creatures scurrying every which way.  The kitchen that night must have looked like a barn dance hoedown as my father, sister, and I began stomping every roach we could manage to destroy.  War had been declared and we were hopelessly outnumbered.

       Our best guess as to where the nasty critters came from was that they had made their way in groceries from the neighborhood market.  Since there weren't many grocery shopping choices in our area back then we continued to shop at that market.  Now however we were more careful about our pickings in that store and checked bags carefully after we brought them home.  Perhaps that stemmed the flow of new incoming roaches, but the ones that were already firmly established in our home were breeding with great abundance.  Roaches were in every cupboard and even showing up inside food packages.  This war was now going to call for drastic measures.   None of our family wanted to live with roaches in our midst.

        So we did the obvious thing and called the exterminator.   This was after an ineffective attempt to use bug spray we bought from the store.  That stuff smelled horrible and probably was eventually as likely to kill us as it would the cockroaches.  The exterminator used a substance that had little lasting odor and the delivery device he used covered every room of the house.   I'm not sure what poison he was using, but it seemed better to deal with that than having to share a house with an ever growing population of cockroaches in that house.

          My mother signed a year-long contract for the exterminator to come by once each month to spray.    After his second visit the cockroaches appeared to be conquered.  If any were still hiding away in the deeper recesses of the house, the succeeding visits by the exterminator must have finished all of them off.   In the fifty years since that incident we have yet to see any return of cockroaches.

          When unwanted invaders threaten to take over ones home, drastic action needs to be taken in order to maintain the status quo of ones life.  Cockroaches are amazing creatures to observe as well as being hardy survivors.  Let's face it though, they are not willing to assimilate into the family like a dog or a cat or any other pet.   Cockroaches are set on establishing their own society without regard to the society upon which they are encroaching.  I for one am not desirous of sharing my living space with cockroaches, rats, or any other unclean pests.   What other options do we have?

Battle of the Bands Song Clue

        On Thursday I will have another Battle of the Bands post.  The story above offers some hints to my song choice, but let me give you a few more:

• The song I'll be using is a very well known folk song that is speculated to date back to the 15th century.

• The song's lyrics have often changed depending on the times and circumstances, but typically the subject matter has to do with politics.

• This song can often be heard in cartoons or comedies.

• You may have sung this ditty when you were a child in school, but with age appropriate lyrics.

• My first presenter of the song is a highly respected American artist who had a fondness for marijuana.

• The second recording is by an immensely talented and highly educated artist from Mexico whose name might make one think she comes from the United States.

        Please be here on Thursday October 1st to find out what song I'll be using and by which artists.   I've been having fun with this one and I hope you'll enjoy it as well.

         Have you ever had to deal with an infestation of pests?  If so, how did you remedy the situation?   Do you have any idea what my next song choice will be?   Can you guess the artists?