YEECH SOME BUGS DESERVE THE DEATH PENALTY

Tom and I agree on most things--politics for instance. We both are progressive, but not slavishly Democrat.  We have voted for a Republican before (rarely) and are supporting a Green candidate this election cycle. It is truly about the issues and the person.

We also agree on movies--musicals, movies with a message (or sappy movies as Jeny calls them), quality cartoons, like Up, movies with a historical theme.

We both like sports, especially basketball and soccer. Tom loves football; I love tennis. We are CRAZY for the Tar Heels, hate Duke, enjoy USC and are interested in Clemson. We follow the NBA.

Tom and I like the same food--basically all food, except that I don't like beets. I can't stand beets. 
 



                                                 
  
                                                         Yuck to beets.

There are some things we do not agree on, but that would be the subject of a different post.

Well, it is sort of, in a way, relevant to this one.  Tom and I absolutely agree about the sanctity of life, about the worth and dignity of every person and the interdependent web of all existence. In some cases that means the same thing to both of us.  We do not believe in the death penalty.  We do not hunt for sport. We do not believe in using fur or exotic animal skins for designer accessories--fancy fur coats, leopard Prada handbags, alligator shoes, meat dresses.

 
Tom and I also agree that we should not destroy animals or insects that invade our home.  Though their natural habitat is outside--in the yard, forest, or garbage or whatever/where-ever, on occasion a creature will come into our house uninvited.  There have been many times when the visitor has been drug in by the cat--as they say,  ungrammatically. Muck is the hunter one of our two cats, who likes to bring her prey in through the cat window, usually still alive. She brings in crickets, grasshoppers, baby rabbits, birds, snakes, frogs, mice. Other creatures wander in on their own--ladybugs, spiders, bees. We always try to get the creature back outside, by picking it up, which works for ladybugs, spiders, even snakes sometimes. We shoo them out through broadly open doors.  That works for birds, rabbits and bees. If we can put a container over the top of them and carry them out, the crickets, grasshoppers and frogs make it outside.  Even the mouse is treated humanely.  We use the type of trap that draws him inside an enclosure with peanut butter bait, slams the door behind and allows us to transport him outside and release him far far away from the house, far away. We respect the sanctity of all creatures, including insects.

........except one.........

When I see a COCKROACH, I step on him. I step on him with a vengeance.  I grind him into pieces. I run him down.   I have no mercy. I am glad he is dead.  If I see one outside, sometimes I kill him as a preventative measure.  That is one cockroach of the 200,000,000,000 in the world that will not be coming into my house. 

Cockroaches abound in South Carolina.  It is hot and damp, which makes an ideal breeding ground for them.  Euphemistically we call them Palmetto bugs.  And, in fact,  there is a slight difference between the two.  Palmetto bug are larger and they can fly!

 
Tom argues that we should treat them as we do other 
 creatures, that they should be carried outside and set free to live their cockroach lives. This is one thing that we have argued about pretty consistently.  I don't think they deserve to live and the thought of picking one up is so revoltingly repulsive that I can taste the bile in my mouth at the thought.  I try to educate Tom about cockroach facts. They spread filth; they cause allergies, including asthma. He maintains that is all Orkin propaganda.

 Recently, I was at the computer in our home office.  He was in the den watching the news on notFox. I heard him   say, rather loudly, "Woooow."  Then he said "Umph."  In a minute he remarked, in a peculiar voice, "The oddest thing just happened!  A huge cockroach just landed on my head. When I tried to knock it off, it kinda got tangled in my hair."  I was incapable of a response.

I do not anticipate that Tom will, upon sighting the next cockroach, be carrying it outside to continue its cockroach life.  In my opinion, some bugs deserve the death penalty.  I wonder if  Tom now agrees.