Throughout my collegiate years, I have come to find stink bugs are disgustingly distracting.
Last week, I was in one of my classes diligently listening to a fellow student’s presentation when it was rudely interrupted by a pesky little stink bug.
I sat by the window in that Ballantine Hall classroom for many reasons. Firstly, people-watching — you won’t believe how many students trip on their way to class. Secondly, I enjoy looking out at all of the trees and surveying the natural beauty of our Bloomington campus.
Nevertheless, sitting by the window has some downfalls. As you might know, air doesn’t circulate well in some of our older, more deteriorated classrooms.
So what does one do when faced with this dilemma? Open the window. Here’s where my story starts.
The stink bug proceeded to fly right into my critical thinking class, completely polluting my educational experience with its constant buzzing and wing-flailing. I became distracted.
My eyes quickly darted toward my peer’s presentation but they kept surreptitiously drifting back. The stinkbug, unaware of its current predicament, had just fallen on its back on the windowsill. Its arms violently paddled through the air trying desperately to gain some traction.
It tried many tactics to get back on its feet — bouncing up and down on it’s slimy back, spinning around like a dradle, continuously buzzing as if its screeches could be heard by some nearby clan of stink bugs.
The annoying pest finally resolved the issue by throwing its body off of the ledge of the windowsill — a suicidal attempt if you ask me — and plummeted to the floor.
My eyes wandered back to the presenter. Honestly, I had no idea what she was talking about. This damn stink bug’s acrobatics had stolen her limelight.
No sooner had I thought the whole bug fiasco had ended, than my ears heard that relentless buzzing. I tried to stare ahead, but all of the people sitting in my row of chairs had their heads turned, they too being fixated on that brown marmorated stink bug.
That was it. I stood up, mid presentation, picked up the bug, and threw it out that window with all of my might. My fellow classmates nodded and smiled at me in appreciation.
I was a hero.
After that class, I went to do some research on these insolent little creatures. Turns out, they’re relatively new to the American bug world.
Natives to China, Japan and Taiwan, stink bugs just don’t know what to do in Hoosier country. They were accidently, and cursedly, familiarized with American terrain in the 1990s.
Stink bugs are freeloaders in every sense of the word. They snuck into the U.S. via shipping containers, and since then have broken into about every single living space known to man.
The worst part about it is that you can’t squish them. What’s a bug good for if you can’t squish it? Nothing.
It looks like Trump might have someone new to pick on that’s his own size.
jlkarl@indiana.edu
@jkarl26
