Exterminator

Last week we had another fun experience that we only get to have due to our move down south -- a visit from the exterminator.  It was his second visit to our home, but I would love to share with you the ridiculous story of how we came to know our very first personal exterminator.

     Jill and I moved from Mankato, Minnesota to Fort Worth, Texas on March 30th, 2009.  What a wild ride with two toddlers in the car (but that is a story for another day).  Three months later, due to a job opportunity I had, we moved to the other side of the "Metroplex" into Carrollton (which borders the cities of Dallas and Plano).

     We moved into a home that we rent from a friend I met at school (Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary).  We are incredibly lucky, we rent the home for about $200 less than any apartment complex I found in the area, and we have about 500 more square feet than any apartment complex I found in the area.  Does anybody believe that God answers prayers?  ;)

     The second night we lived here, a while after the kids were down for the night, I strolled out into the kitchet in just my shorts and t-shirt (no shoes or socks).  When I opened the fridge I thought I saw something odd out of the corner of my eye.  So I looked over my soulder and before I could even comprehend what I saw, I immediately leaped backwards out of the kitchen.  Considering the current size of my love handles I was quite impressed with my athleticism.  Now that I was further back, I could get a "safe" look at this critter.  Even though I had never seen one before in my entire life (at the ripe age of 29), in a split second I could tell it was a disgusting two inch long cockroach!  Gross gross gross. 

I promise you, the screach I let out did not sound masculine in any sort of way.

I did what any man would do, I ran to tell my wife that we had roaches.  Gross, gross, gross.

     That night, we did not get much sleep at all.  Are we a couple of pansies?  No.  We simply are from the wonderful frozen tundra of the Midwest and have never had an encounter with such a wretched creature before.  We didn't know if they could fly, if there were 100 of them, if they would crawl into our bed at night, if they were easy to kill... we didn't know a darn thing about 'em.

     We decided that our best first step was to talk with some people from our Bible Fellowship class at church and see it they had any pointers for us.  Due to the late hour of the night we would have to wait until tomorrow and learn to fend for ourselves for one night.

Needless to say, we were restless and couldn't sleep, no matter how tired our bodies were from settling into a new home all day by moving furniture and boxes around.  So we camped out in the living room together and put an episode of "Friends" in to zone us out.  I wish you could have seen us try to sleep in the living room that night:

 - We were both wearing shoes, because we didn't want to wake up to use the rest room and run into a roach without the ability to sqaush them with our shoes.
 - We kept all the lights on, because we thought that because they were nocturnal, maybe the lights would fool them into thinking it was day time. 
 - We made sure that not a single part of our bodies were touching the ground (as to give the roach an easy route up to our sleeping area) so we both slept curled up on the couch and shared our one chair to rest our legs on. 
 - Sadly, any time I woke up with the sensation to use the restroom, I would try to go back to sleep -- hoping that I could hold it until morning so that I wouldn't have to face a roach.
 - A few different times we commented on how much we missed living in Minnesota.

Anywhoo, I don't want to write a post that is so long that nobody wants to read the full story.  So I will finish by telling you that we learned a lot over the next few days about cockroaches from our new Texas friends.  We even learned the phone number to an exterminator.  He is now one of our very favorite people in the whole world.  Seriously. 

I look forward to sharing a Brooklyn & Jeremiah story with you soon.  Until then, I sure hope that you don't see cockroach antennae sticking out of an outlet socket -- because when I did, I didn't say nice things.

May God bless you and keep you,

Mikey