Off the charts on the ‘eww’ factor
I grew up in Canada. I grew up being afraid of bears, wolves and “The boogie Man“
As I’ve gotten older and wiser, my fear has also changed to include much smaller things… like cockroaches. Such as today, when I was at work, going to the bathroom and a cockroach the length of my pinky ran just in front of my feet (I was wearing open toed sandals). Now, I don’t think that it actually touched me, but to tell the truth I had lifted my feet, was thrashing around, attempting to muffle my own screams (it’s one of those public building washrooms where the men’s is on one floor and the women’s is on the other. The women’s is on the same floor as a bank and I wasn’t sure if the high pitched screeching of a foreign woman would cause any alarm) and I had my eyes closed. The little bastard then ran to my right, just to the side of the toilet, and as I eyeballed him while attempting to do my pants up asap, he seemed to be twitching in anticipation of me moving.
I never knew trying to do your pants up while in a panic was so hard. Of course hoping foot to foot wasn’t helping matters much… blech, so now I can’t stop looking around at everything.
UPDATE – they’re not cockroaches as my kind coworker pointed out; rather they are hairy caterpillars, still gross.
Oh, you poor thing! I hate cockroaches so much!!! They’re definitely something I never experienced growing up in New England, but my first overseas teaching experience was in the Marshall Islands (on Majuro) and we lived in a ghetto apartment (which has since been condemned) that had huge flying roaches. So many of them. They loved to come out when the lights were off, so when we’d come home at night and turn on the lights they were everywhere. SO nasty!!! I never had a big problem with them in Korea. I’d just get the occassional one in my bathtub sometimes, but never anywhere else. Weird.
That sounds horrific. Especially because when I think cockroach I think dirty. Not sure if this is true, but dirty public bathrooms are scary. I felt your fear while trying to pee in the outhouse with big dock spiders!! Sometimes it’s easier to just do up your pants after you run out!! LOL