Creepyginormous roachus: a story of heroism.

Bad things about living in New Orleans? Sure, there's the crime. There's also the awful streets, and the constant rain. Political corruption is rampant, and traffic on I-10 is hideous, but...allow me to share what may well be the worst part of living in New Orleans.

Cockroaches. Yes, cockroaches. Not the tiny German kind...the nasty, palmetto bugs with wings. WINGS, people.

I decided to work from home one afternoon not long ago, and made the trek from St. Rose back to good ol' Orleans Parish. I got home, let myself in, sighed with relief that my house was once again my own (er, our own), scratched Jake's ears and walked into the bedroom to kick off my shoes...

...where I was was confronted by the Largest. Cockroach. On. Earth.

Seriously. This bastage was HUGE. I realize that it's summer in the south, and therefore cockroaches are a part of life even in the cleanest of homes, but while I'll chase off an assclown beating up his girlfriend, the mere sight of a cockroach within a ten meter radius will turn me into That Girl. Y'know, the girl who shrieks like a 5 year-old who has just discovered that Barney is actually a dude in a polyester suit? Yep, just like that.

It was on the wall between our windows, just chillin'. Well, that would never do, would it? I tiptoed backwards out of the bedroom and ran down the hall to the kitchen, where I retrieved the ubiquitous bottle of Raid. I then went to town. However, we have wood floors. Said wood floors became slippery from the misting of Raid and I promptly busted my ass. (Shh, don't tell the boyfriend.) The roach fell off the wall about a foot from where my ass collided rudely with the floor. I, of course, jumped about 4 feet in the air and scrambled onto the bed, where I furtively watched the roach as it oh-so-evilly crawled across the floor.

Now here's the truly terrifying aspect of this horror story - this bitch was so huge, I COULD HEAR IT WALKING ACROSS THE FLOOR.

::involuntary shudder::

What's worse, it had WINGS. It was the classic species, Creepyginormous roachus.

So to recap my moment of terror:

-It was almost 3" long.

-It could fly.

-It was so large that its skinny roach legs made noise when it walked.

-I was trapped in the bedroom with it.

Given that I am prone to creative moments of imaginative randomness, I began to muse as I curled up in the fetal position on my bed, sneezing from overexposure to roach spray. Had the local roach population been exposed to chemicals in the post-Katrina petrochemical spills? Had a new subspecies of superroach evolved from the floodwaters of the Lower 9th Ward?

Either way, I'm fairly sure that there is truth in the old saying that cockroaches, Britney's weave, Lindsay's firecrotch and Paris' wonky eye will survive the coming apocalypse. Together they clearly form the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

But I was not to be vanquished by the forces of evil this day. The roach snuck into the trash can (considerate bastard) where I once again attacked it with the spray. It's dead, thank the good Lord. RIP, you enormous superroach. Mama's got an empty can of roach spray, but the world is once again safe for silly ninnies like myself.