I came home from work the other night and went into the den to put my laptop on my desk. Out of the corner of my eye I saw something moving by the cat’s litter box – and it wasn’t the cat. It was a flying cockroach the size of a beeper. As soon as I realized what it was, I did what anyone else would have done if faced with the same situation – I locked myself in the bathroom and begged Sandy to kill it.

I have absolutely no problem confessing that I am deathly afraid of bugs. I would have rather seen a four foot tall rat in the house than that roach. I don’t know why they affect me the way they do. I know they can’t hurt me and I know that all I have to do is step on the thing to kill it, but when I see one – I freeze. I have no idea why I get this way, but I always have and I probably always will.

After Sandy killed it – and stopped laughing at me – I came out of the bathroom and proceeded to check the rest of the house for any more. She insisted that it just flew in and she was probably right – but I was afraid that there were at least a grillion more in the house – so I had to check.

When I finally calmed down enough to go to bed, all I dreamt about was bugs. Nightmare after nightmare filled my head about roaches. Every time I woke up and went back to sleep, I would have another dream about roaches. All this because of one stupid bug.

I think the reason I react this way to bugs is because of two insect-related experiences I have had that have forever horrified me of anything remotely connected to the insect family:

• It was 1989 and I was hanging out with my girlfriend’s brother Adam who worked in the basement of the building across from where he lived. His job was to empty the garbage from the compactor and bring it outside for collection. As he was replacing the full bag with an empty one, he noticed the machine was making strange noises. When he opened up the machine to see why – an ocean of cockroaches poured out of the machine like water into the twelve square foot room. As he began to run, I stood there literally frozen with fear. I wanted to run, but I couldn’t move. All I could do was watch these bugs inch closer and closer to my frozen body until Adam pulled me away from the roaches who were pouring across the room like a wave that stretches across the sand as it hits the beach. Once the initial shock was over, Adam grabbed a defogger that would normally have the power to kill roaches in an entire house much less a twelve square foot room – we used twelve foggers – and they still kept coming. Needless to say I didn’t sleep quite well that night.

• In 1991, I went to Monte’s – a house with twenty seven and a half acres that my family owns in upstate Lexington, New York. Although the house has full plumbing, there is an outhouse by the fire ring near the forest. As I was making a fire, nature called and I decided to use the outhouse since it was closer. When I opened the outhouse door, I heard something hit the floor and couldn’t figure out what it was. The sudden buzzing I heard around my head gave me a very quick indication of what dropped to the floor – a beehive. Apparently, there was a beehive attached to the door from the inside which I dislodged when I opened the door – much to the chagrin of the bees. As soon as I realized what was going on, I began to scream and literally wave my arms back and forth. I ran from the outhouse to the house and then in circles for the next twenty minutes. I only got stung twice – but try telling me that. I have not used the outhouse since.

So judging by these two lovely experiences you can see why I have an extreme dislike for anything with more than four feet. And each time I see another bug – I remember why I hate them so much.

Remind me to buy stock in Raid….