Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Gifts from Cockroaches

Disappointed to read here that Derek Kelly has lost his case that poker is a game of skill. It was a very high road approach to take to the case. His statements to the Gutshot forum indicate he is willing to fight on. I wish him every success.

I've restarted my morning tour of the perimeters of the rooms of my house. When we first moved here, I was finding a cockroach, about one per day, somewhere along the edge of one of our rooms each morning. Rather than let them pile up, I found it satisfying to seek them with a tour each morning, and flush them.

Well, the stream of inverted insects has stopped. I don't know if it is no longer their season, or if their nest died, or if they no longer find my house worth exploring, or what. In any case, I stopped finding somnolent roaches, so I let the morning tour lapse.

Then I found I missed it. So I have started again. It's actually even more pleasant, to survey my home in the predawn -- turning on one light, circling one room, turning off the light and moving to the next area -- when I don't find a cockroach to dispose of. Yet without the daily incursions, I would not have started the habit I now enjoy.

So I guess I owe them thanks. Not that I will grant them any more mercy, should they again start coming into my home.

I find them viscerally repulsive. It is also a gift that I have learned to deal with them, through the disgust, in a fairly calm and organized manner. That lesson, too, will serve me in the future.

For Derek Kelly, and all others who have hit setbacks -- may the apparent misfortune return many times its cost in unexpected ways.

Anna