Reject du jour: the cockroach lady
(This rejected cartoon was inspired by that particular cöinkydinky.)
When I stayed with a friend for a few months upon my repatriation from Paris, her apartment was undergoing a years long cockroach plague. (It really says something that I prefered the cockroach plague to my parents’ house.) It’s a miracle the entire apartment didn’t just crawl away. You’d never seen quite such an array of cockroaches—surely all the different subtypes were represented. They were everywhere, and got into everything. They were aggressive—they chased me out of the bathroom many times, running at me instead of away from me. The culprit, I always said, must be the old lady next door whose apartment smelled like a giant litterbox. You smelled it as you walked up the stairs to my friend’s apartment door, where you gagged a little as you got your keys out.
“When she dies, you’ll see.” And sure enough, she got hit by a bus, her apartment was gutted and renovated, and voila! No more cockroaches.
When it comes to plagues of cockroaches being due to one’s neighbor, it seems to always be an elderly lady. What does it mean? Sometimes I wonder if the cockroaches become their only friends. Are they good friends, or greedy, uncaring friends? Sad!
The Ansonia Is Plagued by Cockroaches, a Lawsuit Says
