Bear with me, it’s a long story. Hopefully, worth it.
When I was a wee pup, maybe around 4 or 5 or so, Mom packed up my sister and I to go off to Gramma’s house. It was only a 45-minute drive to Gramma’s, but to my 4-year-old brain, that seemed like a really, really long road trip. I had this habit of – on road trips – taking a blanket and laying it across the backs of the two front seats to make a little tent in the backseat. Then I’d hang out in my car tent with my book or my doll or my teddy bear or whatever amusement I’d decided to take with me to Gramma’s house.
So we’re driving along and I’m chilling in my little car tent, spread out across the backseats, laying on my back, watching the sky go by. My gaze shifted just a tiny bit and I noticed this enormous 12-foot juicy green grasshopper innocently sitting there on the roof of the car. It was eyeballin’ me. (Okay, it wasn’t 12-feet, but I was four. It was a big damn grasshopper.)
I freak out and panic and let loose the most blood-curdling, heart-stopping, terrified scream you can imagine.
WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!
My mother stands on the brakes with a horrible squeal, damn near wrecks the car to get it pulled over, jumps out, leaving the car door open, and wrenches the back car door open (it was a sedan, IIRC). I’m screaming and crying and just sort of generally hysterical (because there is a giant grasshopper lookin’ at ME) so it takes her a minute to calm me down enough so I could tell her what my major malfunction was.
I point at the poor grasshopper, and manage to get out, “B-b-b- buh- BUUUUUG.” (Not at all unlike that chick who witnessed the shark attack in Jaws 2.) My mother rolled her eyes and used every shred of self-restraint she could muster to not smack me halfway into next week. She grabs a handful of tissues from her purse, gently picks up the grasshopper with it and removes it from the car. She gets back in and says, “Now I put it under the car tire so it will smash when we drive away and it won’t be able to get you.”
I will have you know, fellow Dopers, that I cried all the rest of the way to Gramma’s house, thinking about how that poor bug had to die for no reason at all and what upset me more than anything was imagining the sound of the CRUNCH it would have made when the tire rolled over it.
This, my friends, is why I never step on bugs. Ever. It’s not that I don’t want cockroach eggs (oh dear god in heaven, did I have to read that?) or smooshed bug goo on my shoes. I don’t. It’s because I cannot stand the sound of smooshed bug.
That poor grasshopper.
So I am infinitely more likely to catch it in a jar or something and carefully relocate it outdoors, safe away from me and my cat where it can live a full and productive life doing buggy things.
P.S. You can imagine my reaction when I’m in the shower and I see one of those damn brown wolf spiders in the shower stall with me? :eek: