EXTERMINATE!

Just a quick post. Yesterday the Bug-Guy stopped by to give our house its annual treatment. It was just in time too--as we were starting to see little columns of tiny brown ants that were coming in through our side entrance and marching right into the kitchen and up onto our counters. These little guys were nothing like the giant beasts in the movie "Them" (1954), but a bothersome nuisance just the same.

The little ants we tend to see occasionally don't bother me as much as another of our persistent guests--the dreaded House Centipede. These buggers are disgusting, and they tend to show up when and where you least expect to see them. Not only are they too gross to want to squash, but they're a lot faster than it seems like they could be--which also makes squashing difficult.

Anyway, those nasty buggers are a topic for another time. What I wanted to mention here was something interesting that appeared in the bill from the exterminator (and I'm not talking about the price charged for services rendered). I don't know much about the chemicals pest eliminators use, but it isn't surprising that there's a wide variety of them available. The bill had a list of chemicals so the exterminator could check off which ones he used. Some of these have pretty scary names. Some might even make good titles for horror movies! Check these out:

WASP FREEZE

BORID BORIC ACID

STING RAY

PERMA DUST

DEMON WP

DRIONE

CONTRAC BLOCK

TEMPO S/C ULTRA

TALON G MINI PELLETS

KICKER

And my favorites... (exclamation points added for effect)

TERMIDOR!

TRI-DIE!

MAXFORCE!

"You thought that 'The Terminator' was bad-ass? You thought 'Godzilla' was a terror? You thought Hannibal Lecter was sick? Well, you haven't seen anything yet. Brace yourselves for the most fearsome creature the earth has ever seen. Prepare for the arrival of...TERMIDOR!"

"In a world where good and evil are a confused jumble of violence...where the phantoms of the night come out in broad daylight...where your worst fears are realized on a daily basis...you'll discover that even death won't protect you from the horrifying new reality. It's not enough to die ONCE. It's not enough to die TWICE. No, in this world you'll discover that three times is the charm. This is the world of...TRI-DIE!"

"Coming soon to a theater near you! He was left for dead--but he rose from the abyss to become a one-man force of vengeance. The evil-doers won't know what hit them. They will rue the day that they decided to mess with...MAXFORCE!"