Close encounters of the cockroach kind
7th February, 2008

How the cockroach got into the fridge remains a mystery. If it had flown in we would have seen it, surely, and it could hardly crawl through the rubber door seal - or could it? Having a cockie in the fridge was bad enough. What was truly unfortunate was its discovery by my wife. Had I found it I would have evinced mild dismay, grabbed a tissue, squished it to death and tossed it in the bin. Instead, I endured a blood-chilling scream from the kitchen as I was in mid-shave. "Aaaarrrrgggghhhh! Maaaarrrrc!" Presuming a knife-wielding intruder had just leapt through the window I ran from the bathroom, an ill-fitting pair of undies flapping around my thighs and my face covered in foam, ready to defend my wife and child. "What?" I screamed, leaping into the kitchen brandishing my safety razor. While there is no record of anyone having successfully repelled a home invader with a safety razor, I was not going to go down without a fight. Rather than an armed housebreaker, however, I was confronted by the sight of my wife staring pale-faced into the interior of the fridge.      "In there!" she shrieked.      "Where?" I screamed. Was there a python in the fridge or had those takeaway noodles I'd been meaning to throw out morphed into an alien life force?      "There!" she said, pointing to the shelves. There aren't too many places to hide in our fridge, given that on a good week it contains little more than a half-dozen eggs, assorted bottles of soy sauce, half a jar of curry paste, jars of marmalade and Vegemite and two stubbies of mid-strength beer which have sat there, unloved and unwanted, for at least two months. I followed the line of her quivering finger and then I saw the cockie, feelers twitching, sitting on the top shelf and contemplating the relative delights of a bottle of Rajah's Choice butter chicken curry paste and half a lime.      "Gotcha!" I yelled and swooped with a piece of paper towel, squishing it into a ball and tossing it in the bin in one smooth movement.      "Omigod!" moaned my wife and ran to the bathroom. Seconds later I could hear the unmistakable sounds of dry-retching, an aural effect that in my younger days signalled the end of another successful Saturday night of enthusiastic social tosspottery. She emerged minutes later, eyed the bin suspiciously and gave me her "you disgusting, dirty male pig" look.      "When was the last time we had this place sprayed for pests?" she demanded. I tried to think of a plausible lie but I wasn't fast enough. "When?" she repeated.      "But we just moved in a few months ago and ... I ...err ... um ... I haven't actually got around to doing that," I admitted. "But it's on the top of my list."      "We've been here for over three months," she said, employing the dramatic eye roll she uses with such effect whenever I ask a particularly moronic question.      "Give or take a few weeks," I said, edging out of the room and retreating to the bathroom to resume my shave. "And it's only one cockroach. One single cockie. It's not exactly what you could call an infestation," I yelled, temporarily deafened as my voice boomed around the tiled walls.      "But it was in the fridge," she shrilled.      "Maybe it was hot," I said, and as I did I could all but hear her eyes rolling skywards like poker machine reels. "I am prepared to concede, however, that perhaps a visit from a friendly pest spray person would not be out of order."      "How about a new fridge?" she suggested, standing at the bathroom door with her hands on her hips.      "That one's only seven years old," I said. "It's almost new..." At this point she made her puppy dog eyes and pouted her lips. Gorgeous. "Okay, okay. Maybe a new fridge."      "Good boy," she said, and smiled sweetly. Do women, I wonder, learn to manipulate men in the womb, or is it an acquired postnatal skill? The former, I suspect.

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