this post was submitted on 31 Jul 2024
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Asklemmy
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Well, probably not what you're looking for but I used to work yard maintenance for a property management company.
I was sent to rake and tidy up the back yard of some house. In the back, there was an entrance to a root cellar that was separate from the house and had crappy wooden doors covering it. I was told to open it up and sweep the steps leading down to the cellar.
I don't have a problem with dark places, or bugs. But that was the first time I'd seen camel crickets. They were big, hump backed and striped. And there were dozens of them. I dutifully swept the steps, from the dead center of them, my eyes darting around constantly trying to gauge whether or not the weird ass bugs were about to launch themselves onto me. They didn't. They were super chill.
I told my dad about it later and he laughed at me for not knowing what the crickets were because they were so common. I've only seen a few more since then, and they still kinda weird me out.
As a teenager, my parents would only let me have a PC if it was situated outside of my room, so naturally, I put my setup in my basement. I was excited to play games in the coolest (temp-wise) room in the house, up until the day a camel cricket decided to jump up my pants and continue to work its way up until I smashed it against myself.
Yuck.
Oof, that sucks.
I kept expecting one to jump from the walls above me as I went downstairs, get into the back of my shirt, and get squished as I try to get it out. It's happened with house centipedes, and it's not fun. Especially when their legs keep moving after their dead.
I've only ever seen camel crickets in one location, a house we moved into when I was around 12 or 13. None of us had ever seen one before. We called them spider crickets because at a glance they look very spidery.
You got lucky. Their mode of defense is actually to launch themselves directly at the threat. So we used to have to mentally prepare ourselves before walking into the basement because there would always be at least one spider cricket jumping right at us.
Holy moly, that sounds like a very unpleasant basement to have to deal with.
"Whelp, time to do laundry. The fun part is when the creepy mutant spider cricket launches itself at my face, yay!"
Clearly I was very lucky. I highly doubt the tenants ever used the place either. It just belonged to the crickets.
Fortunately, the laundry was in the kitchen, so we just used it for storage for things we didn't use much, like Christmas decorations.
They are one of few bugs that freak me out. Too many times did I have them jumping from all directions....
Yikes. Well, at least is was mostly just a fun holiday tradition ๐ฌ