yoshimi battles the pink robots, part 1

things that are unpleasant when returning alone from the hospital at 11pm to wash your face before bed include finding a large cockroach scuttling around the sink where you were about to put your face.

our new orleans readers, i understand that you're all laughing at my squeamishness, but in my defense, it was a very big cockroach, and its little horns or tentacles or whatever were about to be in my nose. also in my defense, i did not scream like a little girl. i jumped, thought about screaming like a little girl but decided that it would wake the hyperactive three-year-old downstairs and then i would never get to sleep, and then commenced a ridiculous chasing of the cockroach around the sink with a washcloth. i incorrectly assessed that it was unable to get out of the sink, and promptly scared it to a hiding place underneath the large shelf where my clothes and suitcase are stored. having decided that i could not move the shelf, i got ready for bed, turned out the lights, and tried to ignore the various bug noises coming from outside. but every time i heard a noise i was sure it was coming from inside my room, and i was sure that the cockroach was taunting me. yes, i understand that cockroaches don't taunt. but this morning when i woke up, there was the cockroach, sitting three inches from my backpack, directly facing me, wiggling its tentacles in mockery. i grabbed for my shoe but it ran back behind the shelf.

so needless to say i'm happy that i packed lots of sealable plastic bags. i'm ready to hermetically seal everything i brought. but i got the last laugh for this round; when i came back from a walk this morning i found it lying on its back in some kind of death throes. i whapped it with a shoe a few times to feel better about myself, like i was the one who had conquered. for all i know the dying cockroach was actually the old disabled grandfather of my nemesis, and my nemesis kicked the old man out of his home to show me who's in charge here. we shall see.