Pop-roach Pops the Question
Cue the cricket choir, and amp up the frog croaking — romance is afoot. Soft, sultry nights just ooze with it… unless you are alone. That feeling has another name — lonely despair (…sigh)! But, enough about me.
Today’s pick-up line: Wild thing, I think I love you.
Presently, we remain confined to my dark ell. My new friend, the pop-roach, mimics my solitary routine. Out here in the open, he moves through my awareness in cautious fashion, scurrying here, investigating there, fearful that a tiny scrap of edibles might be missed… or that he might become a tiny scrap of edible to larger others. It is our his lot in this existence.
Your words for the day (mostly the same as the previous post):
- pop = explode; suddenly increase in size
- roach = cockroach, an insect; various sizes; worse than a fly in my soup
- pop-roach = a cockroach with desires
- CR = cheesy reference (I am shamelessly using big names to improve my blog visibility)
Responding to a disturbance in the force,* pop-roach suddenly became alert. Whatever it was, it exuded an irresistible perfume… to the pop-roach, not me.
Whoa!!! It was a CHICK… or… whatever roach guys call roach gals.
Forgetting the take-out, he homed in on gal. Like a radar-guided missile, he maneuvered his approach to intercept directly from the front. She stopped in her tracks. They met, nose to nose (technically, that might be antennae to antennae, but that’s not so picturesque), and “for a brief, shining moment” there was “Camelot,”** and they stood there, strangers in the night.*** Cue the singers: Wild thing, I think I love you.**** It was a classic “boy meets girl” moment, until…
…pop-roach got carried away and mimicked an overheated popcorn kernel: he EXPLODED. I had never seen anything like that. Barely did they get the prelims out of the way, and testosterone guy jacked up his hind legs so his body was inclined about 45 degrees while maintaining nose contact. Popping the question, “Will you be mine tonight? Say you will, say you will be mine tonight!”,***** he emphasized his ardor by deploying both wings and both wing covers at 90 degree angles to his body, like a frilled lizard magnifying its true size. It was sudden, it was frightening, it looked painful. Jacked-up butt, splayed wings and covers! WOW!!
For her part, gal-roach put out some feelers… uhhh, so to speak. She felt him up (literally) and concluded, “Loo-zer!” She broke off contact and resumed her hunt for take-out. Or a better offer. Whichever came first.
Pop-roach, in true guy fashion, persisted. The scuttlebutt among the guy-roaches down in the sewer drains was that the gals really wanted to be with a guy (wink, wink), and persistence would always pay off. Persistent he could be.
Food now far removed from his mind, he tracked (…H. smart sap. gals might say “stalked”), he intercepted, he repeated his astounding display. “Aw, c’mon! Be mine tonight.”
Again, she considered. Warned by gal-roach gossip that guy-roaches have only one thing on their tiny little minds, she had two options: Romance? No-o-o-o-o! Roach-a-cide? Still considering. After all, she had…
- Opportunity: he is spending a lot of uninvited time in her personal space.
- Motive: What part of “no” could he not understand?
- Means: Possibilities were (1) lure him to a roach motel and let him go in first, (2) lure him close to the foot of that killer-ape who hangs out in their neighborhood. Downside: both choices would put her too close to the kill zone. So, she opted for (3), a sprint out of the area and just hope that he did not follow.
Twice rejected, he gave up and consoled his (probably) broken heart by… scurrying here and there hunting for a bite to eat; comfort food, no doubt to soothe the aching 13 chambers of his heart. (Sheesh! That will take a lot of comforting.)
Two insect entities, two different genders. Both considered to be primitive life forms, yet each of them knows what it will take to satisfy itself. Sounds like “primitive” is up to snuff on this self-awareness thing.
Dr. Smart E. Butt can forget that mirror test. These guys do reflected vibrations, not reflected light.
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*CR#1: the force. Star Wars movie term, George Lucas | **CR#2: Camelot, playwright Alan J. Lerner | ***CR#3: Strangers in the night, Frank Sinatra, Charles Singleton & Eddie Snyder | ****CR#4: Wild Thing, The Troggs, Chip Taylor | *****CR#5: Say You Will, Foreigner, Lou Gramm & Nick Jones
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Previous posts in the TALES FROM MY DARKEST ELL (An exploration into self-awareness)
- Pop-roach does the Colonel
- The Art of Fly Fishing
- The Best Part of Waking Up… is not having to actually get up
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Pop-roach does the Colonel
OOOPS! Maybe that should be “kernel”… as in “popcorn kernel.”
Today’s pick up line: Are you through with that?
The night was cool, the lighting soft. Night sounds, though punctuated by the sound of passing cars, complemented the ambiance. One thing could have made it better: a romantic interest to tease enjoyment from my “all work no play” mode.
But, hey, a warm bag of popcorn at break isn’t half bad, either.
Your words for the day:
- pop = explode; suddenly increase in size
- roach = cockroach: an insect; various sizes; worse than a fly in my soup
- pop-roach = a cockroach with desires
Popcorn is aptly named. You pop a fresh bag into the microwave, kernels pop in the bag, you pop the white fluff into your mouth, and no matter how careful you are, some of that will pop out of your hand or out of your mouth as you crunch them. When done with the lot, the floor around your chair looks like a scene from a snow-globe. Yeah, the popcorn I enjoy scatters everywhere. If I can’t make a clean transfer from bag to hand to mouth, the escapees are on their own. I want nothing more to do with them.
We operate in the macro world. Food crumbs on the floor or ground have crossed over, becoming inedible to humans… at least to those over 8 years of age. It has entered the world of the micro, where the workings of Nature proceed without the constant monitoring of macro denizens.
Contrary to the killer-ape moniker attached to my species (i.e., the great Homo smart sapiens) I did not kill any of the little critters encountered here. Instead, I did the voyeur thing: looked, didn’t touch. Eh… true, in my own home some of these guys would have warrants out for their immediate apprehension, but, here in ell, it’s live-and-let-live. My consignment to this dark corner gave me an opportunity to view those micro works from a detached and non-involved perspective. Those guys operating on the down-low have some interesting behavior on display… such as the charming pop-roach.
He must have viewed my droppings as manna from heaven. On his fast-moving, meandering path across the concrete surface, he came across my snow-field and took the time to investigate. What luck! He located a whole popped kernel and latched onto it without hesitation, which would be expected. I could see the suspended kernel move as he tested it with his… uh… mouth parts. Then, he did something I would expect from a mammalian carnivore, but, not from vermin that is normally content to crawl over its prize along with a hundred others like it and eat in place. This 2-inch cockroach hauled the claimed kernel over to a crevice between the concrete surface and the bottom of the wall panel and proceeded — in relative privacy — to consume its prize…
…an act of indulging a personal whim from a creature viewed as an instinct-bound member of a communal swarm. It would seem that this pop-roach is just eaten up with self-awareness.
Yeah, I know. It couldn’t possibly be aware of itself since, in the mirror test, it would ignore its image and just poop on the smooth surface. Doctor Smart E. Butt — who would be irritated because he has to wipe poop off the reflector so he could admire HIS OWN image — would flunk the poop-roach’s awareness submission in a heartbeat.
But pop-roach doesn’t care about test results. He has his huge food treasure to satisfy HIS appetite and is warming up his moves for a run at a midnight rendezvous. Yes, our 6-legged popcorn miser is also a multi-legged Casanova.
Next up: Wild thing, I think I love you
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Previous posts in TALES FROM MY DARKEST ELL (An exploration into self-awareness)
- The Art of Fly Fishing
- The Best Part of Waking Up… is not having to actually get up
WORDS according to Dean 