milestones in living alone...

there are few times i miss having a roommate more than when it's time to get rid of the Really Huge Bug (RHB).

my friends and family know that i have a mild case of entomophobia, and tend to shriek and hyperventilate when i get too close to bugs. i'm working on it, but honestly, the treatment for phobias is often worse than the irrational fear itself. let's see -- i could use gradual desensitization, where i get closer and closer to scarier and scarier bugs, or i could use flooding, where they just toss me into a vat of bugs. no thanks. so i live with it.

but when i woke up this morning, and a totally terrifying RHB was in my tub, i realized i now lived alone. there was no one else to get rid of the bug. fine. i didn't really want to shower anyway. then i realized i would come home, and the RHB would still be in my tub.

and while i could skip showering for a day, more than that was just silly. i had to be a grown up. i had to get rid of the RHB myself.

so i did it! i got rid of the bug myself, and rewarded myself with a long, hot, shower. and i kept one mistrustful eye on the drain, lest anything else crawl out of it.

the RHB in question, btw, was a common house centipede. i have to say, now that wikipedia has informed me that it injects poison venom through it's fangs, i don't find it all that common. and at 6:00 am it was downright terrifying.