yep. cockroaches. filthy bastards. and they have currently taken over the block of flats in which i live. ill give you the full account

Some time last week: im outside having a fag and start talking to the old man who lives next door. he informs me that the woman across the way, also called jamie, has seen a cockroach. brilliant. she comes out and starts shouting about how much she hates them and blames it on the flat next door, who have supposedly had them since february. i try to get involved with this conversation but am completely snubbed.

forward to sunday: feeling generous, i offer to make a tea for everyone. i open the cupboard to get some cups and spy a lone cockroach running all over some plates. I then make my flatmate catch it and he throws it out of the window. panic ensues. one flatmate is convinced that we will now be over run with them and so we have to clean the kitchen completely, which it probably needed anyway.

Monday: i phone pest control and arrange for them to come over.

wednesday: Pest control man arrives. and doesnt shut up. first he talks me through all the poisons that hes applying. one is a big spray that it is 50 times more lethal than the stuff you buy in shops and the other is peanut butter mixed with poison, as they apparently love peanut butter and curry. im not quite sure how the cockroaches palate has evolved to incorporate these tastes, but i leave it.

next he gives me a lecture on why i shouldnt squash them, as when you do, they shoot the eggs off their backs and he claims nothing on earth can kill a cockroach egg. he says they can stay dormant for up to a year before hatching.

then he goes on to tell me the other pests he kills, mainly mice/rats and wasps. He seems rather saddened by the fact that hes not allowed to carry a gun to kill rates and pigeons with anymore. i dont ask, but he still goes on to tell me about his new gas powered gun hes just bought, with a silencer and laser sight. hes angry cos he says everytime he sets his gun up on selfridges roof to shoot piegons, a lady complains before he gets chance to kill anything and the police make him pack up.

Next, he tells me about how hes had bomb threats and death threats from animal rights protesters and how they tried to push him off a tube platform. i feel sorry for him. he then gets very irate as he tells me that someone is trying to put a portection order on black rats, which he says he is stupid cos they carry the plague. i nod alot but dont say much.

he then gets onto the topic of wasps and tells me about how he went to a ladies house and she had a nest and had been stung loads. it turned out she had poked it with a broom handle and they stung her in return. he LOLs. then he tells me about some super spray that blows up wasps nests when you use it but it got banned cos it had narcotics in it and the council reckoned kids might steal it and sniff it to get high. hes visibly upset by this, as it means he now has to wear his little bee suit for protection, which makes ascending ladders difficult according to him.


finally he leaves, after dropping poison all over my knife block and boring me with the finer details of pest control.


Jamie


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