CREEEEEPPPYYY CRAAAWWLERSSSS
At church on Saturday night, I saw my first centipede. These fun little critters are guys you want to keep your eye on because although their bite doesn’t hurt too bad… the after effects are terrible. Someone explained it as, “It feels like someone is holding something hot on your arm that is continuously burning you." Although I have been introduced to my fair share of creepy crawlers here in Hawaii, I have never had the pleasure of meeting a centipede until Saturday. I was happy to see one so I would know what to look for in the future. It wasn’t too traumatic because we were outside and it was walking away from us.
Then, as we were walking home, I saw my SECOND centipede. Since it was dark, it bothered me a little more, but I was still pretty calm. I stayed calm UNTIL we walked in our apartment and there was one crawling across the floor!!!!!! This sucker was like 6 inches long!!!! And even though Jeni tried to be soooo brave, I got stuck with the job of taking care of this gnarly thing.
I doubt telling this story will do justice to what actually happened… but I’ll try.
Our first thought was to flush him, but we discarded that idea since we don’t know if they can swim. We found out later that they do have super powers- swimming happens to not be one of them. So Jeni grabbed me the biggest knife in our kitchen (anyone want to come over for dinner?) and I chopped him in half. AND THEN BOTH HALVES STARTED CRAWLING AWAY!!!!! We were freaking out! Now I had TWO centipedes to capture and kill! So my screaming assistant grabbed a fork and a jar filled with water and its lid. Since they just multiply when you cut them in half, we decided to drown it… or I should say THEM. In the meantime, the backside of the centipede (not the head half) stopped moving. I went to scoop him up first because it appeared to be LIFELESS. As I went to get him with my trusty fork (you’re still invited to join us for dinner) HE CAME TO LIFE AGAIN!!! The details are a little fuzzy, but I’m pretty sure Jeni was running around in circles screaming her head off… it was like a bad scene from a horror movie.
Well, needless to say, we finally caught BOTH halves and drowned them. Sorry for any nature lovers, but it had to happen. Then I took pictures of him and he now sits by the front door as a warning to his little centipede friends. If you look closely at this picture you can see both halves. I tried to get a good picture of his nasty little head with his mean pinchers and large teeth, but I couldn't get the right angle. You'll have to take my word for it.
FRONT ROW SEATS
Ok, I have to write about this. We have mentioned before that there are like 8,938 cats in the little complex where we live. Some belong to people as evidenced by their collars. Some supposedly belong to other neighbors, which I don’t believe too easily because they don’t have collars. And then there are the strays. There is always some cat drama going on. For example, there are two cats that think they belong to us… they are always on our porch and even try to open our screen door! I actually appreciate their presence because someone told me that they eat cockroaches. And two cats attacked one our friend’s cat a couple a week ago and after the fight, a leg had to be amputated. He’s not used to having only three legs so he still tries to scratch with that leg and his little stump wiggles back and forth. Kind of gross.
But anyway, lately, we have been treated with front row seats to a live show every few nights. Now, its not a hula or Tahitian fire dance… its two cats who sing in the middle of the night! And not just a few notes… an entire concert! One starts in… and then apparently gets the other one going. And they sound like screaming babies!!! The process of them waking me up is so bizarre… first I get that groggy feeling knowing that I’m hearing a sound I shouldn’t be hearing. Then I think it’s a baby crying because our neighbors have a four month old son. Then there’s one screeching part of the song that gives it away that it’s a cat. After a few minutes of listening to this, the second cat joins in and I wonder WHERE ARE THESE CATS (because they sound like they are right outside my window) and WHY AREN’T THEIR “OWNERS” MAKING THEM STOP??!!?? You would think it would only last a few minutes; but I’m always surprise by their vocal endurance as they continue to sing… and sing… and sing…. It reminds me of those old Garfield (I think it was Garfield) comic strips where he sat on the fence with a cat friend and howled at the moonlight.
The bad news is we haven’t figured out a good way to make them stop yet. Jeni tried yelling, “Shut up!” but that seems to only seems to work on the neighbors barking dogs. I tried slamming the door (hey, it was the middle of the night, it was the best idea I could come up with), but so far none of those things work. We are completely open to suggestions!
WHHHOOOOO GOES THERE?
I’m not sure which is worse- having an animal like a cat or dog make noise all the time… or to have an unknown animal making a noise right outside. There has been a mysterious animal lurking around lately. Our house is on stilts (see pictures from earlier posts as reference) so it is quite possible that whole clans and packs of wild animals could take up residence under us. This explains why I have been freaking out about the weirdest, strangest unknown noise that has been floating in through the window.
When I asked someone at youth group what they thought it was, their answer was an owl. Ok, so it does kind of make a “Hoo…hoo..” noise… but an owl living under our house??? I'm not so sure about that. Plus, wouldn’t a singing cat attack a hooting owl?
