If A Fly on the Wall Could Talk, What it would Say!

It's a good thing that God designed insects so they could not speak, because those little critters see an awful lot. Just imagine what they would say given half a chance. I can just see two flies on the manure pile out in the cow pasture, both of them knee deep in the good stuff, and they start up a conversation. "Did you see what old farmer Brown and the Missus were doing last night?" The other fly laughs and stops eating for a moment. "Yeah, that was hilarious! I didn't think they'd ever get that whipped cream off the ceiling fan."

"You said it. My favorite part was when her spurs got caught on his suspenders and they thought they'd need to call 911 to get themselves loose." "Yeah, but the funniest part was that it took them fifteen minutes just to notice." Oh yes, those flies on the wall see an awful lot. They hear an awful lot too, which makes it no wonder that listening devices are popularly known as "bugs." I saw this comedy film one time where the "bug" was an actual cockroach with a listening device glued to its back. That was pretty funny because it seemed to use an insect for its "natural" purpose.

We find insects annoying so we attribute to them all of the annoying factors that we can. If they are exploring a person's ear at 3 am they are bugging that person. If they dive-bomb your head seventy two times in succession, making you closely resemble a pinwheel with your arms swirling around your cranium, they are extremely distressing little vehicles of destruction. A single mosquito or moth can cause an adult person of perfectly normal intelligence to go completely off the deep end.

If you have ever destroyed half a room, with a swinging fly-swatter in one hand and a can of bug spray in the other, then you know what I'm talking about. Bugs are taunters. They love to torment and tease their human opponents and they are very much aware of our shortcomings. They know that as long as they can avoid that swatter, a stomping foot, or the spray, they'll live to torment you again. That is, after all, the only thing a house fly lives for. My personal favorite of house insects is the stink bug. These critters are fully capable of bringing a skunk to its knees in nostril agony and they know it.

You don't dare kill a stink bug, not unless you are prepared for the consequences. If you swat them you'd better do it with a brick and then immediately burn your house down, because you will never set foot within it again, and neither will anyone else for that matter. Squishing them up inside a napkin and then flushing them down the toilet will work, as long as you hold your breath while doing it, completely fumigate your home afterward and then re-build your bathroom. Even your family cat, who will gladly eat gnats, caterpillars, moths and spiders, will avoid touching a stink bug. I saw a brave and hearty cat bat one around once. The poor cat jumped in the air, turned around three times and mewled pitifully for three hours. I think he's still washing that paw.

A stink bug, drawn from memory, approximate actual size.

These evil creatures are the dive bombers of the noxious insect family. They deliberately fly in circles around your head emitting a low-frequency hum due to the fact that they are slow flyers. When they get a bit tired they stop to rest on your shirt, your face, or your food. I watched in stupefied horror one evening while one of these insects strolled relaxedly over an entire plate of cookies that I was about to serve to some guests. Suddenly the guests had just finished dinner, hated those kind of cookies, and finished the rest of their snacks as if they had ten seconds to live. The entire plate of cookies went into the garbage pail which means that the chickens loved us that night. The stink bug in question flew deftly up into the rafters where he watched us with buggy little eyes the rest of the evening. Every once in a while he would show his displeasure at the removal of the food by emitting a quick stink strong enough to make wall paper peel.

I figured out how to get even, though. I saved a plastic jar that used to have peanuts in it, captured a stink bug unawares, (they're pretty stupid and slow to fly away) screwed the cap on and watched him go crazy. That idiotic bug stunk itself to death and three days later, the stink was well on its way to penetrating the sealed plastic jug, which had to be tossed into a fire and destroyed. I was minus one plastic jug which could have been used again to store beads, pennies, baubles, whatever, but it was worth it to know that I had out-smarted a stink bug. On second thought, I probably shouldn't be too proud.