No lie, these things are everywhere. I used to think, “Oh, the praying mantis. That is such a tough motif to use. They must be a super nature-y summer bug that the Japanese and Chinese like to use.” Wrong. There is a practical praying mantis plague at my campus, ‘yall! We’ve been seeing them since the school year started, and now that it is getting cold, they are still lurking. The kids here love the praying mantis and play with them all the time. One girl was trying to get hers to fly and instead incised it into a slashing frenzy before it finally flew/glided away to safety. The other day, I was walking around, and happened to looking down at my mp3 player, when I saw a brown one poised to strike my blue shoes!* Um, excuse me smallish-but-menicing-bug-who-inspired-Kung-Fu-artists-for-centuries, but in case you haven’t noticed, you’re TINY!! Don’t get all “fighting stance” with me or my shoes; I almost squished you! There is a time for defending one’s honor and a time for running, young mantis. What is more, on my way back down the same road, I had forgotten that Little Fearless was still there and I almost stepped on her again! If it wasn’t for my quick thinking, panther-like reflexes, and for the fact that when it moved I was so scared that I jumped back, my mantis would have been sentenced to the 2-demensional world of Flatedness. This is an advisory message to all rough-and-tough praying mantises at ICU: protect yourselves and your families from the big people! They will not always be looking down and there will come a day when you find yourselves in a losing battle against a sneaker.
You have been warned.
Hahaha, that's great. The pigeons here in Spain can be intense. One of my friend hates pigeons and says she has to "dance" with them all the time.
ReplyDeleteThey must have no fear of people if they are willing to get that close to feet. I feel that pigeons in Rome would be like that, too, from the decades of tourists who come to feed them.
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