I was telling a guy about an ordeal in my apartment where it took me a half hour to kill a cockroach because I was too squeamish to squash it’s guts out when I had the chance.  Instead I chased it all over the room with a spray bottle of lysol, hardly strong enough to put down a giant American cockroach - the pus-belied cocoa-colored low to the ground type that has wings but can’t fly except to flap down from something.

I was in bed with the lights out. I had a hangover.  I was sweating.  I felt something on my shoulder.  I swatted at it.  I knew right away it was something large.  I was very slow and deliberate with my movements as I reached for the light.  Then I saw it.  Yep, it was an American cockroach all right.  Hideous.  I slid out of bed backwards with my eyes on the creepy insect, careful not to startle it..  I was heading for the kitchen to find a bottle of something toxic.  I had my eyes on the bug the whole time except for the 2 seconds it took me to locate the Lysol. Ah yes, that ought to do it.

I had my eyes off that shifty creep for less than 2 seconds and when I got back it was gone.  I could not sleep knowing it was in the room.   I got down on my knees, spray can in hand.  The creep was not on the floor.  It must be on the bottom of the mattress.  I got down low and reached in and under the bed and continued relentlessly to spray the box spring till I saw the massive bug emerge in a flash from the far side of the box spring.  I went after it.  

Again we worked the baseboards.  I had several chances to squash it to pulp but am too squeamish for it.  I don’t like the sound, the looks, the mess of it all.  But this time I would not let the bug get past me.  If it ran fast one way I would dash ahead of it and spray it the other way.  I kept doing this till I hemmed it in - to drown it to death.  This did not work either.  I was drenched in sweat.  The bug took off again.  I made a big mistake.  I let it get under the heaviest and most unstable fixture in the room, the TV table.  It was too risky, too rickety to move.  So again I got down on the ground again, dripping in sweat from a hangover by the way, and pointed the can under the table and kept spraying till I saw it emerge in a flash once again on the far side of the table.  This time I vowed never again.  I was bent low working it with the spray bottle when I passed a pair of dusty hiking boots I had not worn in years.  I grabbed one and caved the bug to mush. "Why didn't I think of this earlier?"  Man, what a workout.

So I’m telling this story to a guy and he says, “You know, you really don’t have to kill them, they’re harmless”, to which I instantly and sincerely reply, “Ugly ain’t harmless.”  And it’s true.  Scientists attribute our fear of spiders and other creatures to the fact that those creatures can be deadly - some kind of caveman instinct type thing.  But I say it goes beyond that to the reality that all earthly creatures are related, no matter how distant - as far as I’m concerned not distant enough.  Such is the case with all ugly creatures.  They represent the past.  These are creatures that have beaten extinction.

I see a large gathering of “Save the animals” people where a huge anti extinction rally is being held.  40,000 people gathered in one arena to chant against extinction.   “No go extinct, no go extinct", they cry over and over, before emerging as one from the belly of the stadium to the sidewalks above where the first thing they see are thousands of dinosaurs bearing down on them.  They don't know it yet, but their anti extinction chants brought the Big Boys back to life. Some things need to stay dead - even things that ain't dead yet.
 
By the way, the guy in the story, the one who suggested I 'trap and release' the roach was Bozo who made the suggestion after I told him the cockroach story.  It was obvious he was looking for an opportunity to make himself seem more caring and compassionate and humane than me.  The point is I'm an honest guy, so I'm telling you now that right from the start I wanted to tell you it was Bozo in the story, not just any old guy - but I hesitated to mention his name because I knew if I did you might not be able to concentrate on my story, thinking more of Bozo than the bug and I who were the stars of the show.  Do you forgive me?