I heated up my leftovers from dinner last night with my neighbor. She made a wonderful cream of broccoli soup and added in almost a WHOLE package of bleu cheese! I used the other small chunk of cheese she sent me home with to put on some warm pita bread and watched the howlers eat. What other place can you have this kind of nighttime entertainment from your front porch? 
So after darkness settled in, I was just here on the computer, minding my own business and I heard something. It was like a small commuter plane coming into my verandah. It buzzed by in back of me and then THWACK! It landed on something. Terror gripped me immediately as my eyes darted around the room, looking for the new invader. I’m instantly brought back to memories of that roach. You remember the ROACH, right? I look up at the light…nothing. The ceiling…nothing. The wall next to my bedroom door…and then BAM!!!
For once, I had my camera and even took a 3 minute video of this thing (which, BTW is not a roach but a long horned beetle). At one point in the video, it dropped from the ceiling and I sort of screamed like a little girl…a TRUE scream you just can’t make up. My god, the last thing I want is this thing to get on me…especially after seeing the mandibles on this dude. LOOK AT THAT MOUTH!!! It looks like it could cut through my bike chain!! Here’s the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwxaevpJzK4&feature=youtu.be
And what kind of bad ass has ANCHORS for FEET!?!?!? As if the jaws of life can opener face wasn’t horrifying enough…ANCHORS? REALLY??? So eerily, he’s sort of settled in the same spot as the roach had…I hope not waiting for some innocent gecko to come by or for me to get up and pass under it. I will need to do that at some point…but he seems pretty comfy…ANCHORED in there. In the video (which I will post eventually) I said, once again, it was about 4″ long. I’ll peg him more at 3″ without the antennae. I’ve been trying to find out what they eat besides small villages, but I can’t find a thing for some reason.
You’re not going to believe this but I just saw the beetle move and sure enough a gecko is right in front of it. They faced off for a while and the gecko is now backing down and running away. Phew. Now if my leg is chewed off at the knee in the morning, you have a picture of the suspect.
Anyway, I’ll try to leave you with a little less of a scary picture of a couple crabs that were in my yard. Actually there has been an influx of them since the heavy rains…they’re coming up from the beach. Every single one is different…the larger ones have yellower legs and the small ones are more orange all over. Absolutely beautiful. Now why aren’t I scared of these guys?? Look at the claws on them! Maybe because they’re so darn cute when they run sideways!?
And I thought the stink bugs were bad! I’d say this critter is more scared of you than you are of it, but clearly, that isn’t true.
CLEARLY!! Ha ha. I don’t know what it is about roach looking relatives but I’m not happy about them.
It does have anchors! I thought you were making it up. The thing doesn’t even look real – I’m probably having a nightmare about your nightmare. I’ll wake up in a minute and find that there was no blog with bugs from hell on my computer at all. Hope the alarm goes off soon!
hahaha I know, right?! I spent much of my time in Costa Rica averting my eyes and ignoring things from the dark side. Very much how a child deals with scary things – hands over ears and singing LA LA LA LA at the top of my lungs. Brave you for sucking it up for the photo op.
You got that right, sista! If I have to go into the kitchen after dark, I flip on the light and just look directly in front of me…where I need to step, what I need to do but not beyond that. I swear, I’m always amazed at the new insects that show up here. Just when you thought you’d seen most of them….