Independence Day

My neighborhood really out did itself this year with the fire works. The fire crackers were not up to par, definitely not as numerous as last year’s July 4thcelebration; lacking in quantity – definitely – which you would expect I reckon, seeing how far we are still into the ‘Great Recession’ but there were some shudderingly really big booms to make up for the lack of fire cracker’s crackle; we get enough gun shots around here almost all the time anyway –;

But the fireworks - now they – or someone, brought that affair, those explosive light shows in the dark sky to a whole new level…

What the neighborhood may have lost in quantity from last year’s crackle & fireworks show they, or someone, on this evening of this year’s 4th certainly made up for with quality – I am talking Macy’s quality.

I mean the show, the experience, unbelievable – extraordinary!

I have never seen such a display coming out of a residential neighborhood and I am watching this unbelievable display from my 7th floor window. I am impressed, can’t help myself!

Why would I want to? It is the 4th. And it is in evenings such as this I reminisce as to the meaning of the day and what all brought me to this spot on the 7thfloor in my life and I feel lucky, perhaps, to be alive.

The bombs, the shells are being thrown up from a rise about maybe 10 blocks west of m. And this fire works display went on sporadically for three hours or more into the night and into early morning; now there, in terms of duration, they – whoever ‘they’ are - certainly beat Macy’s and maybe even more representative than Macy’s in the spirit of rebellion and the persistence of revolution & war the shells being thrown into a dark foreboding sky in an independence struggle; I am not really sure although it seems so; there had to be a risk in all this rebellious activity.

And between the fire crackling and stout booms echoing off tall buildings and tenement walls a missile screams across the sky trailing twirling ribbons of color and colorful sparks falling to earth; Macy isn’t too good at that either; no tenement walls echoing anymore on the shores midtown of the Hudson.


And all this is coming from a poor neighborhood in the South Bronx – least they supposed to be poor; trust me some are definitely poor.

So I am sitting in the comfort and in the relative(?) safety of my apartment thanking my lucky stars and I can not help thinking who, who is doing this – who is responsible for this display?

Whose got the money? Whose got the money to purchase these, I am sure, expensive shells? And they just throw them away throw them up high into the dark sky, blasting off from a rise in this Bronx neighborhood; blasting off the highest rise in the neighborhood does help with the final height of the explosion of the glitter & sparkles & streamers showering alluring beauty almost scary beauty falling down to earth, and there I began to chuckle – am I crazy? Pay for fireworks? This is the South Bronx!

Those shells have had to have fallen off a truck’s back end.

I eased carefully into another tact on that line of thinking…But still, off a truck or not – who would do this? Take the chance & time to give a bit of enjoyment in this neighborhood and in some ways certainly outdoing Macy’s.

Then I am thinking gangs – perhaps as a payback to their neighborhood, Robin Hood style, and no doubt be an excellent recruiting tool for the young – Hell at that moment even I considering offering my meager services & skills – I am living in their South Bronx neighborhood enjoying a spectacle I would have never believed, never imagined…

Earlier that day I had taken a walk up that rise west and down the other side to a park; actually it is a rather huge park given the neighborhood.

It is about a block & a half wide and 10 blocks long, right up to Yankee Stadium; there is even a pretty big swimming pool in the middle of the park.

I went to the park because a friend I had recently made, he told me; actually he came to visit me at my apartment, unannounced, yesterday evening – my first visitor from the neighborhood; I have finally arrived!

He was inviting me to this park and he is telling me they are having a July 4th barbecue there in this park and he told me to call him the next day and he would come by and take me there, walk me over that rise and down the other side into the park.

Well I couldn’t find my cell phone that next morning; that is always a chore in itself, one I am really rarely up for even in the worst of circumstances. It would mean I would have to clean my apartment – ee - gads – this is July 4th! It is a holiday – I am on vacation; I can’t work today!

Anyway I figured I would just walk over the hill by myself, I’ve done that walk before; I could do it and find him in the park; it wouldn’t be that difficult…well I was in for a surprise.

Even walking over the hill was a chore…the sidewalks were filled with families and extended families and, and hangers on filling the sidewalks barbecuing, actually barbecuing in the middle of the sidewalks and with all the people hanging about & some dogs & some few cats I decided me trying to walk through that mess of people and animals might be considered a ‘dis’ (an act of disrespect) and with the quantity of enough empty beer cans and bottles and who the hell knows what else (I know) already littering the curb this early in the afternoon I decided taking the high road, actually this path is already rising up the hill.

The best approach is for me to be walking in the street, in the street, when even on the best days and especially given this celebrating day the choice is only the lesser of two evils; I wonder if some in this neighborhood understand what this celebration is all about; maybe they all actually do.

Anyway I got to the park coming down the other side of the hill and as I approach the park I could not believe my eyes – every way, every where are clumps and groups, some very large groups of people of all ages and sizes and colors and a cacophony of sounds; there had to be thousands.

As I looked across the great expanse of the park I realized finding my friend would be a daunting almost impossible task and I felt some regret – but I figured I would give this search a try – every few feet, and I mean that is about how fast you could travel with the young kids screaming – zooming about on their little two wheel shiny bicycles in complete abandon – you – I rather, you are taking your life in your hands; and helmets? Please. Is it a law? I need one.

And along the asphalt pathways every few feet camped or settled in or mostly plopped on the ground, some on the grass, others on dirt, it seemed not make a difference as I slowly passed another clump of family and extended family and hangers on and etc, etc…with the tables set up and canopies pitched and more tables stacked with food, some of the food familiar. some of the food definitely not so familiar - and I have been around - and always the ubiquitous dominos with old men laughing and at every clump a boom box or for those sites staked at the edges of the park a thick electrical cable snaked to a powerful looking SUV, then in that camp site, a veritable sonic boom of almost, almost stadium quality – if not quantity.

The cacophony of sounds & dodging these little skamps & miscreants on zooming bicycles & skateboards in complete abandon and disregard and throwing hard balls for catch in this crowd – and water balloons!

Wow! Dodged that one!

OK – that’s it! My head is spinning swimming – and I decided to go; obviously. There was no way I was going to find my friend in this – mess!

And then all of a sudden I see this face looking back at me – looking up at me in between he trying to put a key into a lock, a small lock locking a Port-a Potty door.

He looks up at me and I see a spark of recognition; he knows me! And he extends a hand and we shake and I still don’t exactly remember him but I am getting this feeling it might be from that neighborhood Dominican bar I sometimes frequent and where I had met my other friend, the one who invited me here and where, at that bar, he is the Bouncer Supremo and you can imagine or maybe even understand why I might not be able to exactly remember this man, meeting him here today in bright hot afternoon sunlight, not sure if I recognizing him from that Dominican bar and considering what all happens, or can happen, in a South Bronx bar; it makes some sense, but he sure remembers me!

I guess that shouldn’t be such a surprise…

Anyway he knows me and I have found a friend in this mess!

He goes back to trying to fit a key into this little brass pad lock on this Port-a-Potty door that is surly separating him from a blissful nirvana.

He suddenly gives up and puts the pile of keys – he is literally carrying piles of keys of all sizes and shapes on two large silver key rings; I realize he has been trying to pick the lock on that Port-a-Potty door! Is this what life is coming to?

“You don’t have the key?” I ask.

“Nah, I got this little one I thought would work.” He says dejectedly, I sensed, he still fingering, looking at that little key from the rest; I figure he was sure it would have worked, the little key, the little soldier had failed him and he seemed now without recourse, none of the others would do.

Then this big fat black woman comes up and says to him this is not a public Port-a-Potty; it belongs to that woman over there but she is not around now and I thought Oh My God they carry in their own commercial grade Port-a-Potty to this event?! (Port – a – Potty’s are all commercial grade, right?); and we are in the middle of this teaming park!

And I am thinking does she need a permit for this thing; dragging it into the middle of the park?

“So what are you going to do?” I ask him. “How about the public bathroom?” as I gaze out over this mass of humanity and I suddenly realize I have not seen a public bathroom yet, other than this locked Port-a-Potty.

And he just shrugs as we are walking slowly away (that is the only way you can walk in these environs unless you are a young little squirt).

“What about the pool?” I gestured to the pool behind us, the public pool; though more than 500 yards away I can hear the kids screaming in her waters and he says to me

“No, they’re closed.”

and I am thinking – Jesus – the color of that water now with all those screaming kids…

“So what are you going to do? Piss behind a bush and get a ticket?” (though, I have yet to see a cop here in this park; can you imagine with all this surging humanity?) and I am thinking what are all these people going to do with beer bottles and soda cans piling up and it was hot as hell in the sun.

He seemed to have a plan but apparently not going to reveal the plan to me and he told me that he had not seen my friend ‘Cuba’ yet this day though he was expected and we slowed at a cross roads in the park and he stopped extending his hand and he said “Well…” and I understood and there would be no way I would be a ‘hanger on’ in anyone’s barbecue on this Independence Day awaiting my big bouncer friend ‘Cuba’ to show and I understood and I told him to tell ‘Cuba’ I was here looking for him and he said he surly would and we left each other that hot afternoon and I negotiated my way safely (thank God) out of the Park and decided to get on the 4 train that borders the east side of the Park (it’s air conditioned (I hope to hell!)) and headed downtown.

I was ruminating on about my bouncer friend ‘Cuba’. He was actually no longer a bouncer, having recently slashed the tires of a particularly prominent customer who had insulted him; such are the high emotions flowing through this, my South Bronx neighborhood.

I got off at Grand Central to see what is going on in Bryant Park behind the great Library on the 4th of July.

When I say ‘night & day’ between the two parks I mean, in no uncertain terms, the difference between ‘night & day’ – no barbecue cooking, surely – OK maybe a whiff once in a while a whiff of Marijuana but even that is pretty rare in Bryant Park – too many under-covers; pretty much from there the similarities end – stops even –; a very nice bathroom there at Bryant Park and as always a bouquet of the most beautiful flowers placed delicately on the sink in the Men’s Room and I am sure there is a bouquet in the Women’s Room - probably prettier; when I say this is the most beautiful most cleanly public bathroom facility in the City – I mince no words.

After the bathroom I went to the out door reading space and picked up a Monday’s NY Times paper, sat down on a chair under a very nice umbrella and casually read today’s news, listening to little birds chirping, looking about the park, reading of the goings on in the world as I watched, casually, the beautiful people leisurely strolling in the quietness of the park and its comfortably open paths and sometimes I paid a closer attention & interest to a particular tourist. It seemed a lot of Asians that day (thank God) and northern Europeans it seems…

After about an hour of this relaxation I heard on a rather disturbingly loud loudspeaker the powers who be were about to open the great green lawn in the middle of the park at 5 PM in preparation of showing that evening’s film on this huge screen that fronts the west side of that very green very beautiful lawn; she is explaining: no chairs no blankets no plastic lay downs (ruins the grass for others etc, etc.); Easy Rider will be playing at 9 –; well as great a film as that is (although many – some? - thought differently back in the day) I decided to move on.

One reason I wanted to move on is that I have this ‘one month unlimited’ Metro card – one could even consider the card a ‘pass’, perhaps, though that idea may be dangerous; I wanted to use that card soo bad since I had been laid up sick, by maybe food poisoning – it was all vegetables and beans for God’s sake!

Even though I cook my own food I had not cooked some exotic garnish I had purchased in an unfamiliar store as part of a mission to make an interesting bean salad. THIS IS A WARNING: be careful of unfamiliar garnish - uncooked? Laid me out for four days throwing up and then the other end; OK, maybe what afflicted me was just a hell of a mean 48 hour virus; it happens though rarely to me – no matter – I was pissed! I wanted FULL VALUE off my unlimited Metro card and feeling I had gypped myself (or the garnish had) of the value of that card me being laid down & out for four days and I’d be damned not getting my value due! Maybe the Scottish in me; and so this being the 1st day I felt capable, kinda normal, I could at least walk in public without fear – you know - I am going to use the hell out of this card; that is how crazy I am.

Perhaps I am crazy just this one day, today, because I am recovering from a sickness and feeling stronger, finally; maybe that is what is making me crazy just this one time, feeling all this energy after days of barely moving.

So I took the bus down 5th Avenue; really a very nice an almost scenic ride if you had never, and it is a Limited! What luck! So we made almost no stops and we passed the place I once lived, 20 5th Avenue, as the bus turned left on 8th street and I turned my head, still staring at the canopy: 20 5th, – man I have come so far, such a long way in life.

A few moments later we were in the University District and the bus’ last stop and I got off; there were only a few of us left; the few others were obviously tourists looking all confused in the stopped bus though they all got off, looking confused and I got off and walked down Broadway into Chinatown – I love Chinatown for obvious reasons.

I knew where I am going yet I did not want to, not ready to, commit.

I looked at the fruit and vegetable offerings pushing onto the sidewalks – pints of blueberries for $1.50! - $1.00! Tempting, very tempting;…I love blueberries and considering I had not eaten for nearly 4 days, almost a week really if you consider the run up (and run out) – but no – I did not want to carry them 2 pints because I had finally decided to commit; I am taking the D train to Coney Island.

I am a NYC kid yet I had yet to go to Coney Island on the 4th of July and now having an unlimited Metro card itching in my pocket, stubbornly passing up the blueberries, I went down below at Grand Street & swiped my card excitedly –yeah!- another usage!

Well I got down to the platform and it is crowded and I am thinking good sign! a train is surely on the way! Then I am thinking, bad sign – you rarely see this platform this crowded, even at rush hour, and at Grand this platform is very thin, very dangerous this crowded, and I am thinking: Shit! The D is up there somewhere stuck uptown and I will never get to Coney Island today; then I am thinking man, if the train ever does come it will be packed! Packed! And it is so hot on the crowded platform, very hot.

Well the D finally rumbles in and it wasn’t packed, crowed, yes, and after we all got in it was almost packed and while it did thin out a bit as we headed for Coney Island, that being its last stop; that wasn’t nothing compared to what was coming.

At Coney Island it was unbelievable as perhaps you might expect – the pandemonium – the amount of people, the quantity, leaving and arriving; four train lines end and pull out from here.

People huffing & stuffing & trying to move up or down the concrete stairs coming from or going to those train platforms; you, I could barely move and the cursing and the shouting and grumbling – way worse than any midtown rush hour scene you or certainly I had ever seen or ever witnessed – and the equipment!

We are not talking here of a business man’s neat brown leather attaché case or even once in a while you see in the subway a wheeling black suit case; no, we are talking beach umbrellas on long poles & huge coolers & very important beach balls, (trust me on those large colorful beach balls; kids screaming) and baby carriages – oh my God the sizes of which I have never seen – quadruplets!! All crushed together stuffed cheek to squeezing jowl on these now harrowing claustrophobic clogging narrow concrete stairwells struggling people trying to get up and trying to get down and you know; I am sure you are aware of this old chestnut that often times makes living in NYC livable or at least survivable without a fight: ‘stay to your right’.

For some reason some, many, in my ghetto, for instance, are either unawares of this chestnut of advice or doing the opposing act on purpose as a sort of rebellion, veering left, actually commanding, demanding, the dark(?) side of the sidewalk – Hell it is Independence Day, do what the fuck you want! Saliva and blood dripping from one’s mouth…

For some reason some people are not so good at accepting or understanding that old chestnut of advice.

You may be able to imagine the most numerous of these violators in their personal hell all crammed, a whole mess of ‘em crammed, packed together every which way in this concrete enclosed stairwell cursing and shoving and sun burnt and sweating and frustrated – what a stink! – “I want to go home!” the baby cries! As some others I am sure do too.

“I want to go to the beach!” other babies wail, the people trying to force their way down the stairs and up the stairs – hey, we are all in this together – right? In spite of Independence Day?

Conflicting desires always a brewing problem.

But on the 4th of July?!

Of course, where and what better a day? And one wrong move – or ‘dis’ perhaps mistakenly misinterpreted - the umbrella poles come out even in this enclosed now haunting place & fuck the children!

Troubling, those struggling in frustration to make their way on Independence Day; it really is easier than this. Isn’t it? Stay to your right?

Well I finally made my way down and out of that hell and nobody pushed me – that would have been impossible so packed we all were struggling for a certain sort of release and independence.

In that tight crowded stairwell the brilliance, the genius, the usefulness of that old chestnut came into full flower that afternoon; at least for me it did.

Finally extricating myself from the station proper and that troubling mayhem, I found myself on Surf Avenue facing Coney Island only having to cross the street (yeah right).

I did cross the street and now approaching the boardwalk some hundreds of yards off and the crowd is spreading out a bit, given the ever more wider openings; space allowing now, and I looked up in amazement at two of the many new rides a renovated Coney Island is bringing to us all.

These two stood out because these two were the closest and certainly, close up, the tallest – one had to be 15 stories high – more! Two opposing arms circling rigidly as clock hands though it seemed to me more deadly and I looked in awe and in amazement and I have to admit, fright.

Each opposing arm, each 100 feet at least long or more, 200 feet apart, end from end, tip to tip, rotating, whipping. inscribing a huge circle in the sea air with a small, very small group of people stuffed screaming at the ends of each arm so many hundreds of feet apart, eight poor souls in a huddle banded together in a tip, screaming on small seats much as I could tell as this spinning whirling specter of death proceeded whirling with eight in an open vulnerable pod stuck at each long end of these opposing rotating skewers circumscribing a wide arc swinging quickly towards the ground as the people howled then just as quickly turned up into the sky screaming and in the middle of the whirling giant fiend, in the center of this whirling specter of death, as the two long arms rotated around is a hellish frightful face of a Humpty Dumty frozen puppet or even a Jack in the Box frozen at the top of his game; at the apex of an explosion popping out from his box with evil wide frenzied eyes and even more sinister smile in full, bearing all his bright white hungry teeth; it is a shuddering sight with those two long arms rotating about him as captured prey spinning to their death.

Right next to him was another contraption.

Two very tall poles set apart as goal posts standing 100 yards apart and 200 feet tall and strung over the tops of these two poles is a long cable starting from aside one pole, one end of the cable on the ground rolled around a huge winch then strung over the top of one pole then crossing the abyss between the two poles and the cable strung over the top of the other pole and back down to another winch, holding fast on the other side, bolted onto a cement pad poured on the ground.

And in between the two poles resting in the middle, on that cable, resting dangerously, I am thinking anxiously, is attached to the cable a tiny pod housing four terrified souls and through the amazing magic of engineering or just sheer magic the ends of the cable would be pulled from each side the winches groaning wildly winding up very quickly and the poles would bend and groan and the cable would be pulled away each from an end pulled away from each other with such fearousity and force and speed the pod riding precariously on the cable is being flung, flying up into the blue sky and then the pause for a moment at the cable’s, and by attachment, the pod’s, apex, high above the tops of those very tall poles and then gravity would be denied no longer, the pod containing those few sorry souls plummeting in free fall back to mother earth and all the while the sorry souls within that cage screaming, screaming all the while – ahh woo is me – stopping just short of disaster and then the cage is hurled back into the heavens as a rubber band pulled taught then sprung, the poor souls screaming all the time…

I could look no longer and turned away in unease and even fright.

As I turned away from the devilish unholy sight edging towards the boardwalk a large mouth opened from the side of a wall and whispered “Enter” as I peered into a black dark maw surrounded by glistening fangs and though others were waiting in line to enter; I backed away – I would not be fooled although I did not – could not see enough ahead to realize I was entering another hell.

The Coney Island boardwalk is packed – packed I tell you! You could not move – I mean I could but only as the crowd moved, and although I would like to be able to comment on the desirability and even the functionality of the newly renovated boardwalk I can not – I could not even see the boardwalk not being able to look down so packed we are as sardines in a can although indeed I can comment on the functionality: the boardwalk did not collapse in what obviously one can only reckon is under ‘maximum load’!

I was finally pushed to the southern edge of this morass and I could see pieces of the blue ocean and then I thought I am looking at the beach in front of me or where I supposed the beach to be, but indeed all I saw was an undulating brown like mass, a rippling brownish mass with some few brighter colorful spots as in a loosely woven rug and then I realized that brownish mass are people and their closely held beach accoutrements and I was aghast, packed so tightly there not even a grain of sand visible – oh my God – I had never seen such sights and hope to never again.

I finally got popped out of the pressing crowd and found myself in front of the public baths – a bathroom is a very important place to be after having your kidneys squeezed dry and your bladder held in tight repose.

The entrance labeled ‘Men’s Room’ seemed safe enough yet what all I had seen so far I could not be sure and glancing over to my right to the entrance labeled ‘Woman’s Room’ the line to that entrance snaked around and out to a place I could not see the end and I found some comfort there in the familiarity of the sight though when I heard a whisper the wait on that line exceed 45 minutes and when one would finally find yourself inside (not me! (I piss in the street need be)); there is no toilet paper – ah woo is she…

Later that evening while winding down quietly from such a day’s experience I heard on the news that there had been quite a scene at Coney Island concerning that toilet paper (or lack there of); the 45 minute plus wait seemed to be taken in stride, and while it would not be the type of scene one could expect when the men get riled – I mean, come on, these are polite women – at least most of them – on TV the Commissioner of the Parks Department said there would be a full investigation – FULL INVESTIGATION – yeah, right – TO FIND OUT THE WHERES AND THE WHERE FORES AND THE WHY for such as this could happen; lack of toilet paper! – yeah I must set my clock, put that date on my calendar to make sure I am alert and sober and conscious so as to not miss that reporting conclusion and the mitigation.

Anyway, back at Coney Island I had seen enough and I knew, for me at least, it was time to leave – to go home.

Figuring out how to get out of here, to get through that packed crowd – I don’t want to get into the particulars – I actually entertained jumping into the ocean and swimming to Staten Island (how crazy is that?) but that would mean I would have to step on that undulating colorful spotty brown carpet; eewh.

I finally got out to a relatively less crowded sidewalk – looking at people waiting on line what would seem to me an eternity for clams on the half shell or a Nathan’s hot dog.

I looked at three cops standing almost forlornly, it seemed to me, tired for sure – it had to have been a long day and it was still hot as hell no matter an ocean breeze; the air is actually still.

Looking at those three police I wondered, I knew there would be no way to control anything in that tightly packed mass of humanity if it or a few within it decided to move the wrong way – I almost felt sorry for those three.

Now I was away from all that although still close enough, I still seeing those evil contraping instruments tossing frightened screaming souls about and around; I am sure at least one kid pissed his pants that day, and around and up and down and high into the air and that evil mask of a face still facing me grinning badly happily in evilness weird all the while staring at be with his bulging eyes showing all his bright white teeth.

There is no way I am going back to that train station and go through that nightmare; I had gotten out safe once this afternoon, I will not test fate and my luck again (often I do; not today) and since I had an unlimited Metro card itching to be used I found an empty – relatively empty – Brooklyn bus and took it to points far away from Coney Island, to a quiet subway station and I breathing a sigh of relief, although a quiet subway station in Brooklyn can be at least as dangerous as what I had just experienced in Coney Island, and to be fair, the other places this exciting day I had visited perhaps just as dangerous (even Bryant Park??) although a quiet subway station is, at least, not as annoying if damage is going to be done to me regardless; a quiet subway station not as annoying; the run up to treachery is anyway always preparing…so might as well not be annoyed in the interim.

I finally got home safely;

Do you believe it!?

I had survived screaming tykes on their 2 wheel speedsters, ill thrown hardballs, water balloons, umbrella poles, a particularly loud and possibly violent drunk – oh – did I not tell you about him? Well all of a sudden he threw up and the threat dissipated which seemed to allay the fear in that subway car for the moment though the car stunk like hell as we all moved out and through and onto other cars through those end subway car doors that are against the law to use, ahh what the hell, it is Independence Day! And I am sure my Metro card is all worn out and satisfied as am I; you have to be careful with an unlimited Metro card you know, that Metro card, almost colored in the colors of Halloween, can get you in trouble if not conservatively used.

And then the booming started and then I wondered looking out my window at the unexpected very impressive light show long into the night watching out my window into the next early morning sparkling streaming colors being thrown into a dark sky from a top that rise of a hill-

Who are those people?

Should I join them, whoever they are on this Independence Day?

I really want to.

Happy July 4th.

Grubs and other Bugs

I noticing while in my small apartment the other night a bag of my brown rice becoming infested with little white grubs and other little brown moth-like flying creatures (grubs fully forming into flying beasts?  After eating my rice!).  I can see many of the ingrates through the clear plastic packaging moving about having, it seems, a grand ‘ol time, time of their life, probably; on my dime; for sure.  But for how long?  I can see they all looking for a way out. Infesting the rest of my space?

Ruminating on the cycle of life and did my mother ever love me…looking deeper into the grains.

Anyway there is no way I am going to dump my hard earned rice for a few pesky insects; I briefly considering adding the grubs to my rice dish - deciding against that recipe (even though some scientists insisting these grubs and their protein are the best way out of ‘our’ world 'food crisis'.  Grow more?!  Tasting as chicken I hearing).

There I am on my knees hanging over the white porcelain tub wall considering how near I am to my hoary forefathers desperately sifting through precious vermin ridden grain.

So I spreading out the rice on a newspaper sheet in the bottom of my bathtub, the headline proclaiming HERO DOG EUTHANIZED BT MISTAKE; remembering having done something as such once myself and trying to read further when lo and behold the grubs are crawling out of my rice off the newspaper and up the tub walls, right in front of my face!  The ability of nature to crawl straight up slick porcelain walls never ceasing to amaze me.

And now I am thinking why are the grubs leaving their 'home' and more importantly, their food source?

Why did I ever do that?

As I am watching all these grubs, well almost all of them, there were only about a dozen to start – now almost two dozen as more grubs are revealing themselves crawling out from beneath my grains of rice; I killing the few flying beasts fast, so confused and slow moving they are, I don’t want them getting about.

The grubs are all measuring less than a 16th of an inch and they all are crawling diligently up the bathtub wall then onward up over the tub lip and up the tile wall pushing their back end forward their tiny midsection rising then their front flattening forward 1/16^th by 1/16^th of an inch they travelling and I asking myself, I am thinking 'Where are they going - and more importantly: why?"

I often wonder where in the hell I am going – and why?  And at a rate of 1/16^th of an inch seems about right.  Should I be learning a lesson here?  Why bother.

Well as I watching 2 of the more active, quicker, of the inching 24 or so - even more now coming out of my mound of rice as I am spreading the grains apart - these 2 particular grubs are making good headway up the wall and then seemingly heading for a far off  tri-corner of where the top of the two bathroom tiled walls meet the bathroom’s white painted sheet rock ceiling and for the first time I looking up and really looking and noticing a slight crack in that corner and low and behold those two grubs way ahead of the rest are heading right for that dark crack which, given their size and the distance the two are traveling is miles from the newspaper and rice they leaving at the bottom of the tub.  Why?  How do they even know that crack is there?

To my amazement the two grubs are slipping inside that small crack, one after another.  What are they going to do, conspiring together, inside that dark crevice?

I still don't know but took no chances killing the rest then cooking the rice.

I shudder to think of what is happening behind my walls and what next to expect as I tossing and turning with full stomach to a troubling sleep…

And I dreaming of a far off time recalling animal experiments and one I often recalling performing on a gerbil family, an about to be forming family, at that moment I not knowing how soon the future family would appear…

In those days while I am building a house in Bremerton on the Olympic Peninsular my friend brings two gerbils into the place.  It starts (as all gerbil stories do I guess) with an adult female and adult male, at least I guess they are adults.  I don’t ask their ages and they carrying no ID that I can see though one gerbil having a white dot atop its head, but then most who passing through that almost built house in those days offering no ID which perhaps just as well.

I often wonder now, am I building my house to create a family, a better family, than the one I almost had…never having...all the while destroying me?

We put the two gerbils into a handy 2’ x 4’ low walled wooden box formally housing new orange tiles destined for the kitchen; on the open top of the box we placing a covering of an iron grate left over from a piece of rebar mesh that needs to be used while pouring cement, embedded, hidden in the cement as the cement hardens giving the cement a concealed unseen powerful stiff spine, all this in order to adhere to code; this time the steel grate allowing us to see down into the box from above.

The beauty of living in a house you are building is there are always all sorts of materials lying about for artsy & crafty kinds of pursuits and even for crafty ‘science’ experiments.

We named the two ‘Meat & Potatoes’ – I don’t know why exactly though we are eating a fair amount of those two in those days, one guy in the group is working in a supermarket another in a doughnut shop, we are eating a hell of a lot of meat and doughnuts, so maybe naming them thus is in unconscious preparation for a future feast…

Anyway, one gerbil, the one with the white spot atop its head is certainly the more industrious of the two, grabbing each bit of newspaper scrap I fluttering from above, some of the scraps sticking on the ribs of the rusty metal grate and that gerbil with the white spot atop his head would rise up on its hind legs grabbing the bit down.  That gerbil seeming to be building a house of sorts, or a nest at least, in a corner of the box, so we figuring he is a ‘he’ since we are building a house too – well at least I am – the rest of the my(?) crew usually hanging about getting high and drinking Olympia beer; I usually only trusting them with the dumb end of a tape measure.

I briefly considering feeding the two gerbils some beer – for the purposes of science of course - and as a house warming party, so to speak, bringing them all into the family fold.  We are all drinking beer and I feeling particularly magnanimous.

Well were we very very wrong about who is who, oooh and how many times I making that mistake before, in late night port bars in downtown Seattle, for instance.  I wonder if those bars existing still, on the edges of the dark sea lapping their mysterious fare…

Well in this case the ‘he’ is a ‘she’ and before long little baby gerbils showing up one early morning as they always do she dropping and popping out a pile of ‘em.

You can pretty much count on nature for some things, not like others I know, and it probably a good thing I didn’t feed her any beer her being pregnant ‘n all – who knew?

So a dozen or more of them little creatures showing up (or popped out (or whichever whatever you prefer)), and I filling the box with more newspaper bits to make their space more livable and 'comfy'.  The baby gerbils are practically naked of fur and the whole family group in a lump seeming very content to be all under the newspaper bits I fluttering in from above, perhaps too content - too comfy - I thinking...

Some of the 'experiments' I always doing on God's creatures early in my life as a young boy often do sometimes trouble me, though I know they shouldn’t – why should they?  You remember the seduction of the magnifying glass; and now once I getting off that warship (CV Kitty Hawk) I sometimes finding myself thinking back of the all sorts of experiments I performing and always thinking of new ones, although this experiment ain't so bad (and no one dying, ‘least not immediately).

So all of a sudden I having this 'vision' and begin removing bits of newspaper day by day until finally there are only a few bits and the whole brood piling up one upon each other, on and under one another, for warmth in one corner of the box and the mother piling on top of hers all, obviously, it seeming to me, for warmth.  Maybe I am being too anthropomorphic here; I hoping to God these gerbils not thinking as I do, or even worse, thinking as some of my other questionable associates; so primitive and warped even they can often times, sometimes be.

In the other far off corner of the box diagonally opposite from the mother and her liter is the father, shivering all alone.

Interesting situations often happen when resources scarce.

You know one day this girl wandering into my yard; I am building this house pretty much in the woods and many times you never sure what you finding, what is turning up wandering through the place.  She is pretty enough and she saying she is 18 but there is no way (at least sixteen I hoping); so I saying she can stay in my shed for a while, I had a rumpled shabby bed in there I sometimes use, and I figuring just for an experiment, just to see; well word getting around the property fast that day; my friends lining up, one after another outside my shed door as I cautiously watching from the house as I nailing nails, banging my thumb a time or two – “Damn!” -, but no matter, that experiment working pretty well, I guess, but thanking God she leaving after a few days and never coming back; and more importantly, no police showing up.  Maybe she left ‘cause she was hungry; feeding her wasn’t part of the experiment; watching her stumbling away down the dirt road, wondering if I did right giving her a bed ‘n all.  Had she no place else to stay; is housing so scarce?  I had a chicken shed too on the property.  Would that have been a better, more appropriate offering?

Speaking of the barnyard, I remembering fondly of an experiment I once devising with a rooster.  I actually kinda of liking the guy; in the middle of that experiment he still gamely strutting about on his two legs in spite of what is obviously happening right in front of him, though clearly I am seeing a bit of unsurety in his gate, the cock of his head more cautious, leery ‘n cagey even, and wary, definitely wary; he perceiving perhaps his approaching predicament; we already taking apart all his hens and eating them…

Speaking of the barnyard, you know once we caught a mouse – I know it ain’t much, all we got -…in jail – in prison if you prefer, where resources are usually considered scarce – you know – Do you?  No scarcity there you know enough and being there long enough though it did take two of us to catch this little mouse alive – unhurt – it scrambling around come on man get with the program! – it having 4 legs so it moving pretty quick – it is a he – we sorted that out early, immediately keeping him away from the even more freaky characters in our cell block – come on man – it only a mouse! – sometimes when resources scarce almost anything will do –leave the fucker alone! – anyway we dressed the little grey bugger in his own orange jump suit – ok – jail suit – one of the freaks in here volunteered – no force – he (she?) who really knows my jail mate excitedly volunteers to dress the mouse – our mouse – up, fancy stitching too.

So now we got a mouse dressed in orange – clean ‘crispy’ – his clothes are – the best ‘crispy’ you can find in here – or even outside, we can get that too, maybe we should have – no, no – the outfit fits – his clothes are, and two sets!  Only the best for our little friend; and I ain’t lying here; - no matter – right?  I am a criminal, or at least once…how well we treating our little grey friend;

We feeding him too – oh yeah, we got plenty to feed him and none of our ‘friends’ fucking with him in here all dressed clean and ‘crispy’ and well fed and my little charge all of a sudden biting the hand who feeding him – !

Well – I am not saying he learning by association though justice in here always – usually – swift – (he should have known – learned) it ain’t taking years, and rather cruel I thinking and swift though what does this poor little creature know of larger issues?

No matter my protestations – swift justice from the angry finger bleeding inmate, he way bigger than me though I thinking at that moment loving our friend even more than me flushing our little grey friend to a watery grave, down and out never to be seen again and one left over crispy orange suit ready for the next…

As I appreciatively and with some fondness remembering experiments I designing quite spontaneously to study the effects of shortages of resources ‘n all I am watching these gerbils in amazement; it is winter in the Pacific Northwest and as I having no heat in the house survival is serious business, at least I figuring for the gerbil family it is.  I wondering if they all going to make it, or more accurately, how long it going to take for their most likely demise; in science you can never be sure of the outcome.

So the brood and their mother are piling in a corner, the brown mound spasmodically moving as each little one jerking its hind legs against the rest trying to nose closer into the warmer middle underside of their mother while pushing their other siblings out, and at the other end of the box the father is shivering in his lonely corner; this going on now for quite a while…Surprising…Why should it be?

Then the father seeming to get up some small bit of gumption or maybe even courage (or outrage?) and a mission seems to be flashing in the irises of his dark eyes and he is hunching up on his fore paws looking directly across that expanse, his whiskers twitching…and all of a sudden he darting across the box over to the mother and her brood, filching a scrap, a small bit of newspaper – I mean how much can a gerbil carry in his mouth(?) -  and he then scurrying back to his corner.

Now we are talking maybe four little scraps of newspaper I leaving in the box, and those four little scraps really can hardly be doing anything in terms of heat retention for the mother and her pile of progeny and certainly nothing for the father, and losing one more snippet I can not see making a hell of a lot of difference to her, or her kids, but that not seeming the point for this family, and their dynamics, if I can be so bold.  But what do I know?  Do I know? This is why I am doing the experiment!

So as I was saying, the father scurries directly across the box over to her and her – his(?) brood - snatching one snippet, one little snip of newspaper in his mouth then retreating back to his corner.

The mother looks up and realizing what has happened quickly runs over to the shivering father in his corner; he is facing her twitching and shivering, facing it seems the inevitable and she pulls the newspaper scrap away from him, rather easily she accomplishing this I thinking, well he is not really hiding the scrap, I mean where could he hide it?  She carrying the scrap back to her corner and her kids.  She is not running back, no fear here.

The father surely seems chagrined and unsure, his darkening eyes darting about, his pointy nose twitching even his whiskers twitching, he certainly shivering and not a few moments pass I sense he is getting the courage again (or having no choice?) of trying to acquire that scrap of newspaper for a second time; I can tell, you can see the way his front shoulders are rolling up again rippling under his brown fur and readying for a move, nervously eyeing that scrap of paper across the box and then suddenly he makes his move and he is again scurrying across the floor of the box and managing to grab that scrap of newspaper again – as I recall it that part of the funnies I rarely see the humor in but now I am smiling, chuckling actually a fleeting memory of a similar situation I once, unfortunately, finding myself...

This time the mother is ready (how does she know?) and quickly follows after him as he trying to get back in his corner unmolested but she with obvious determination and quick with her mouth and a wily swift movement of her paws and a surprising dexterity as I always finding some women, many women, pretty damn good at these moves, especially overseas – he don’t make it.  She grabs an edge of that colorful scrap of the funnies and the two are now literally having a tug of war in the middle of a wooden box for that scrap of paper – nose to nose.  So exciting and so much tension suddenly crowding the room, we actually laying down wagers - all in good fun of course - our cheering and yelling filling the living room, “beers all around!”, and oddly the gerbils seeming oblivious to the excitement and heat the two are generating so engrossed are they in a struggle of nature that surely precedes the tides of time…There is never any doubt which of the two would win; those some damn long odds we placing on that poor bastard.

After many tugs, back and forth in the middle of the box they struggling first one way closer to her corner then the other way to his, stubbornly digging their tiny amber claws into the wooden floor of the box, I am surprised the snippet of paper not splitting in two, then they be having two even smaller pieces to fight over!  (Now that would be funny!).  Neither he nor she giving an inch, tugging nose to nose, pretty tenacious he is this time, I thinking I hearing growling…Will this be turning into a blood fest?!

In the end the mother wins, he stumbling backwards losing his toothy grip on the scrap and she carrying that scrap of the funnies back to her brood and the father once again shivering in his far away corner all alone his whiskers twitching, defeated, foiled, again plotting his next desperate move I reckon, probably gnashing his teeth, though I cannot say, for sure; I for damn sure would be plotting a desperate move for a woman or some heat.

At that moment in this early winter morning I feeling so much gratefulness of my well being and having a God given opportunity to witness such a beautiful engaging scene and feeling such rushes of emotion and soo much empathy for the condition of that gerbil family I can continue no longer with the experiment and immediately I dancing around the wooden box as Pan my beautiful breath condensing fog I am alive and I am warm in this winter morning fluttering fresh new snippets and scraps of newsprint into the box and those two gerbils getting very busy, for a while actually working together, squeaking in excitement, even the kids seeming happy…

Maybe, I am thinking, this is how God planning, but I ain’t set eyes on Him, yet, and I got a number of beefs with Him and especially his stupid plans; he better not show his face to me any time soon.

Anyway the father, all of a sudden, is allowed back into the family fold and I would like to say the family living happily ever-after, or at least for a time being, and the whole family certainly all having the appearance of being very happy that morning, and for many mornings to come…

This is before I devising the next experiment; I can’t help myself – I am a scientist!

Experiments can teach you many things in the most unexpected of ways and experiments have the capacity to both teach the scientist tester, and the testee, as in teaching a rat to dance say, it seeming an admirable intention, or as in the time, a long time ago, I wondering if two tiny matches can actually burn down a whole house; the concept seeming impossible; I considering this concept for an experiment in the basement of my house.

Finally the all consuming fire actually needing only one tiny match!  Can you imagine?!  The power of science.  Who knew?!  Boy there sure were some lessons learned that night from the most unexpected – Wow!  And what screaming!

I always finding that dear gerbil experiment especially interesting, endearing even; the father could have added additional, much needed warmth to that mother and kids by he too piling onto the pile, though, for some reason, and again I may be just being too anthropomorphic on this observation, it seeming he was being ostracized as if he solely to blame for this, his family’s condition, or at least blamed for the continuation of the condition and his ostracization would continue until he 'manned up' and changed the condition, for the better, obviously, that his family, his brood, had found themselves in or he will be dying in the effort, for certainly that what I planning for him…

Good thing he ain’t bigger and knowing about me and my influence regarding his condition…I having been there, in that situation before, and there can be and there is hell to pay.

I coming a long way from that far off Olympic Peninsula now as I musing in my memories and possibly loose morality and certainly my mischievously unfeeling hands always it seems adding to the already so so many predicaments of the animal kingdom when I spying a cockroach scampering across my kitchen table; the nerve of the beast!  The bug stops, freezing actually, these vermin always seeming to invariably reveal a sixth sense when they strongly suspecting mine eyes upon them, its antennae still at first, then twitching, searching?  I know these bastards and immediately deciding on a new experiment and having a clear glass tumbler nearby I quickly – for surely you have to be quick with these little pests – they having usually six legs after all!  I pouncing, capturing the roach under the glass and then settling down to watching the critter, intently; and I am patient.  You have to be patient…this is what science all about, that and a healthy dose of curiosity, depraved curiosity, I sometimes fearing, and surely stern unbending faithful persistence.

You know one time in that house I building in Bremerton a rat family deciding to move in, and I not minding at first, I mean I can be a nice enough fellow – Lord knows in that house I allowing more than one pack of two legged rats to pass through but this new family is noisy, noisy as hell and starting their partying in my kitchen (what else is new?) as soon as I laying down to sleep in a back room, dreaming of one day soon that room being a real bedroom, fancy like, maybe with me and a wife and a child on the way?  Could such a thing happen?  To me?

Well after a couple of nights of their inconsiderations, for all their partying and thrashing about and who knows what all they doing – under my roof! And making a mess of it all!

I could not sleep; and messing up my dreams too...

So I laying a big rat trap and I had not laid down that night for more than a moment - these rats can’t wait to party – it is as if they waiting in the wings – in my kitchen - in the walls!  Then their squeaking and the noise and thrashing about and food boxes tumbling down and, and - damn they are so noisy! - and then I hear a loud SNAP!  Then a lot of confusing squeaking and tweeting and even more squeaking and scurrying, then suddenly silence, other than this disconcerting flopping noise.

I getting up, naked I am; I always sleeping naked, being always prepared for I don’t know what – not this for sure –and I walking around scattered construction material and a table saw briefly considering an experiment, walking through the darkened living room sentimentally skirting by the empty long ago vacated gerbil box and turning into the kitchen there is a rat as big as a cat caught in that trap by its thick grey neck and this big rat not looking happy at all baring its teeth its eyes bulging in fear and I am sure anger and I am sure I hearing the damn thing barking so pissed it is flopping about trying to get free; I would be angry too  – and I am angry – the son of a bitch!  I am angry as hell because the damn thing ain’t dead yet, and then I knew what I must do.

I am not in the mood that evening for another one of my long drawn out experiments, therefore, picking up a nearby broom and I am now – God help me - beating the shit out of the son of a bitch – beating the hell out of the damn rat to an inch of its life.  There I am standing barefoot and naked in the middle of sawdust and nails and broken plywood praying that rat will not be getting free until I am finishing banging ‘n beating the bejesus out of him with the head of a broom in the half shadows, in darkness, beating that simple creature with a broom, its yellowish bristles laying into him harshly…man I know if he ever getting loose what he doing.  Worrying about my bare toes not inches from his bared teeth.  Fuck him; I taking my chances.

I finally leaving the bastard twitching on the verge of consciousness as a warning to the rest of the family; if they are willing, maybe he won’t be starving to death and I going to sleep, trying to dream (you know that is impossible – right?).

I hearing no further noises, nor further partying that night.  All is silent in God’s kingdom and in mine.

His friends never showing that night, nor the next morning.  What else is new?

Well it has been a couple of days by now with that glass tumbler overturned on my kitchen table and you can tell the cockroach knowing he is in a fix; there is no way out of my glass jail.  I don’t care how small he can squish himself into some practically fantastical one dimensional flat line.

These cockroaches can do the damndest things.

Do you know cockroaches eat their dead?  This is why it is better to lay baking powder laced with warfarin (a type of blood thinner or perhaps better said: ‘anticoagulant’, also used in rat poison), the baking powder clogs their air pores as they walking unawares through the powder (these roaches breath through their skin) and once they returning to their nest, settling behind your wall, that roach dies, through suffocation, and once dead his confederates eat him, they eat their dead, these roaches will eat practically anything and they be eating their dead roach brother right there behind your wall, and then those roaches will die a difficult and probably, hopefully, confusing death of internal bleeding (even roaches have blood) having ingested the anticoagulant laced in their friend.  Do they have friends?  Not after that meal.

I regularly wonder, often cautiously, about my supposed friends and what harm they can be doing – to me…would they - eat me, if - ?

Do you know when you chop off a roach’s head it will live for another 9 days, or more even I heard if you keep cleaning the mold off the bastard.

As I have mentioned the roach breathes through its skin, or exoskeleton, if you prefer, it doesn’t need its head to breath (or apparently even to think); it dies in 9 days because it starves to death (mine did), or at least the one we decapitated with dental floss did.  That is one knarly idea we coming upon that night, the brown bastard crawling around with no head trailing a tail of white dental floss (unwaxed – no mercy here).  Oh my God, one hell of a good scene.

You know once, a long time ago we catching a sea robin from the ocean, it an ugly damn thing and ain’t worth a shit to eat I’m told; too many bones and needle like spikes; it looking down right prehistoric!  We fishing off a pier and we all excited now as little monsters always getting: – we CATCHING something! dropping the flaying sea robin off the hook onto the ground and its needle like spines all sticking out dangerous as hell and its gross colored slimy wings spreading open and its large mouth opening wide, huge disgusting lips desperately gasping for breath and croaking up a storm; what a sound!  The monster can’t breathe in the air – we knowing that!

So there we are circling staring at this gross looking frantically flaying monster and then we getting a great idea! to throw pebbles into the creature’s gaping gasping mouth and the one of us three who is able to toss the most pebbles in, making the most accurate shots, wins!

I won! though my two droogs making a number of good shots too.

Anyway the fish’s stomach is surely full by now since the more pebbles we throwing in are rolling back out of its mouth and we taking mercy on the poor bastard – I don’t why -, it being still alive I guess, and dropping the monster back into the sea and we watching the fish move as a fish does, wriggling desperately sinuously undulating its body but curiously making no headway in the murky bay water as it sinking straight down to the bottom of the sea, out of sight.  I often wonder what happening to that fish; maybe we should still be keeping the monster on a hook, but that fish I later learning is a bottom feeder anyway, so probably we doing that monster a favor, I’m sure; I am sure we doing our good deed for that day.

Anyway God takes care of His own I keep hearing; and God can be pretty mean too, I know, I’ve seen it too; so ‘least it’s good we do a good deed even though He don’t.

So without a head a cockroach cannot eat, so it is starving to death.

Thank God there is a way to kill these damn things even though we know after The Bomb is finally dropped we all be gone and those pesky vexatious cockroaches will still be here (I guess God planning that too!) – so I do what I can while I am here – the least I can do for the public good even though He don’t care.

Do you know scientists have attached electrodes to a roach’s head and some other parts of its anatomy (I know where I’d attach) and can make a roach dance around?!  These scientists saying they doing this experiment to see how a cockroach thinks or something but PETA getting all pissed off; I guess because someone putting the experiment on YouTube; now that is one damn funny video, especially if you knowing cockroaches.  Anyway PETA is decrying the scientists for demeaning the lowly cockroach or some other bullshit – don’t shake PETA’s cage!  Actually – yeah…yeah – YES!  Shake PETA’s cage then Pamela Anderson will show up naked – again, by God!  Oh my God…

Oooh, I love her so much; I’d love to get her; do some… wicked, very wicked… debauchery!..experimenting; there!  With her, of course with her and with her careful acceptance, and permission of course no matter the scientist in me – no other way –correct?  Am I getting that right, at least?  I do soo love her she makes me so craxy – why is that?  Whose fault is that?

And now I am smelling garlic; the garlic is cooking again next door.  I don’t like garlic so much, certainly the smell which I am sure attracts the most unsavory of creatures.

I am sure my next door neighbor is a pig, don’t clean too good, I’m sure.

I am going to have to do something about this troubling conspiracy between my piggy neighbor and the roaches she surely breeding; an experiment needing, crying out, to be devised; that is where they all coming from.

I am sick of feeding the damn varmints anyway, especially as uninvited guests grubbing what they can without my permission though finally now I surmising who is responsible for these uninvited visits and the constant filching of my stuff.

Yeah – I ain’t stupid – I know, for I surely discerning a plot of conspiracy now.

Maybe I am getting crazy; life making me crazy…can be, life can be - harsh.

Conspiracy is always hyping itself as an ever more serious infraction than the crime itself and therefore surely deserving of greater punishment; the stick approach is therefore calling for forming new, fascinating behaviors in order to strongly encourage personal responsibility...yeah…

My troubling mind is fixing upon an idea, another experiment is forming.  I do what I can to keep this building clean and always in the good name of science; pondering my next move and mulling over which articles, apparatuses and contraptions I must collect for the benefit of my neighbor’s lesson; learning through the beauty and always animating influence of science; ‘better living through science’; electrodes maybe…

Staring fixedly at this roach in my tumbler, as I contemplating these disquieting seductive obvious facts and opportunities and comparing a roach’s physiology to a human’s and the various experiments roiling about in my head and having no doubt, of the final conclusion of this experiment I noticing a protrusion extending out the roach’s rear and growing, seemingly resembling - a dark egg? - an expanding egg sack! my God have I captured a mother!? The he is a she!  This roach from my next door neighbor’s space and carrying her babies to my place in her bum too! to boot!

What ethical or even worse, moral considerations and tasty revulsions now facing me?

And then the egg sack begins to shake and vibrate and then hundreds of her progeny, little black dots pouring out of her butt.  Is it possible these tiny little buggers can crawl underneath my glass jail and get out?!  These buggers always finding a crack, an opening you never imagining, never seeing coming and my resolve, customarily steadfast, beginning to wane as I considering other options immediately eying a can of Black Flag while ruminating those freaking black dots may shortly be escaping; but I holding fast, inexorable in my scientific purpose and patience, looking with horror in the face of uncontrollable infestation.

Though I am mixed about the smell of gas warfare I am certainly more than satisfied with the results, though its use that night is not needed as you will see.  God in his wisdom and His allocating of uneven resources capturing beautifully in this experiment and also combining the eclectic diet of a cockroach and in so doing providing many a satisfying and grisly scene taking place inside my clear glass jail as day number 9 passing that new roach family by.  Not for the faint of heart these gruesome scenes; day after day as the survival of the fittest playing to its grinding conclusion I can hardly sleep (do you know roaches chew sideways?), and once again patience proving to be a most certain of the virtues, finally the mother expiring too, with her mouth full.