'The Bug Incident' - part 1

Okay, so it’s 9:30 pm. I have just finished eating a terribly prepared supper.
How could that be? After all, cooking is normally a pleasure. I do pretty well in the kitchen. Am I an Emeril, Flay or Puck? Well, maybe not. Truth is, a few years ago I was at a party in France and for some reason this cute Parisienne starts talking to me about the world renowned 'Le Cordon Bleu'. With the look on my face, she new I had no clue. Well, so what? It was a lousy party anyways.

Back on point, rarrrely are the results so unsavory nor does fresh pasta fall into my plate resembling curly shredded cardboard, as was the case this evening. The culprit behind my cooking catastrophe? Ok, here goes… the bug incident. Those two insects, the ones I mentioned last night, just before I retired to the not so serene sound and light show of a midnight summer storm, have continued to (I apologize) bug me all day. Crazy, especially considering all the people I wrote to, the news I read, the documentaries with Martin Luther King, on the bogus HIV virus, a program about Innovative Recycling and a couple of TED programs that I watched... I mean, there was heavy downpour and cracks of thunder, directly over my house, for much of the night. Still, all I can think about is the harrowing, unnecessarily difficult bug rescue. Why?

Well first, here is what happened.
As I was making a few last entries to Facebook last night, I looked up at the ceiling’s edge over what is typically the head of my bed. This was easy to do because for the first time ever, due to the storm, I had decided to turn 180 degrees, meaning, I was looking away from the window. Instead, my direct view was mainly my laptop, the head of the bed and suddenly, lurking high-up on the wall, a 'creepy crawler’. There you go. Now you know that I am neither a wanna-be celebrity chef nor entomologist. I wonder if such people do exist. In other words,’star' bug scientists. I guess if they did I wouldn’t ask. Then again, considering where I now live, I might as well be exiled on Neptune. But I am not. Here I am and there I was. Me and that bug. 

The, ceiling lights were off. I just had a table lamp on. So, all that I could make of the critter was that it was large. Not monstrous. Just, you know, big enough to keep me distracted from the shuddering thunderclaps. Not to mention probably up all night. Where is it going to go? Does it have wings? Can it fly? Will it zip into one of my ears and exit out the other in the middle of the night? And what if it doesn’t exit, what then? Actually, this once happened to a colleague of mine while I was working on a film down in Gainesville, Florida. Arrgh! Not pretty. Well, I realize that my story might seem rather trivial, a not so unusual situation but you see, I had some obstacles to contend with. The first was physical. Since I am continuing to recover from my awful back injury, hopping out of bed, should the insect have decided to practice aerial maneuvers around my noggin, could have been dangerous, if not worse. I am off the crutches, thankfully, however, I always try to keep them within crawling distance. (chuckle)

The other hitch was entirely psychological. You see, I was raised in mid-town Manhattan, in a low-rent, five-story brownstone apartment building. The kind with clothe-lines on the rooftop, fire escapes on the face, pizza parlors at street level and gangs in the alley. My mother and I moved there after a few years in Grenwich Village. True, overall the mid-town scenery was way better but the conditions were still pretty, let’s say ‘challenging'. I will spare you the details, but basically, we had a steady case of roach infestation. During the city’s hot and humid summers, it would become something of a nightmare (un cochemare), especially for this kid. So, to this day, as much as I love ‘em, I ain’t too comfortable with creepy crawlers looking straight down on me. How about you?

So, now you see why I needed to deal with the situation, not to mention that it didn’t do him or her (I never checked) any good to be trapped inside my house. After all, there is a forest just outside my door!!

Kinda late now… I’ll gladly continue tomorrow if you want. Just show me a ‘Like'
Good night.
E~