05 April 2002

 

The other day Sonya went outside her workplace to eat lunch.

"I sat down," she said, "and I felt something crunch under my shoe."

It was a caterpillar.

"And they were everywhere!" she went on, "they were coming out of the sky!"

"Were they...on you?" I asked, my bug-phobia making my skin crawl. 

"Two of them were," she confirmed, "I had to yank 'em off. Then I went back inside and kept asking coworkers if I had any more on me."

Yuck.

I asked her if the caterpillars in question had a horn on one end. Sonya didn't know, but the next day she came back and said the caterpillars were still there and yes, they did have a horn.

God. I've heard the sting these caterpillars can give you with their horns is right painful, too. All those legs and a stinger? Why haven't we eliminated this species yet?