Battle Of The Beetles.

A lone window stood open, rattling against the wind.

And ZOOM!

It flew into my room, straight towards my study lamp, which was surprisingly on today. Scuttling towards my economics book, it stopped there, looking at me menacingly. Yes, it was the dreaded black tiger beetle, or in lay man terms, a creature of the

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Coleoptera
Suborder: Adephaga
Family: Carabidae
Subfamily: Cicindelinae

Being the non violent person that I am, I tried coaxing it to return to the place it had come from. Never smash an insect, my pet spider had once told me (he asks me to tell you the same. So, please, never kill an insect.)

Using all forms of politeness, deceit, coaxing and non violence I could think of, I tried to shoo it away from my room.

First, I complimented him on his gorgeous, handsome, cute looks. A glimmering black body, six slender legs, two feelers, he was the prettiest beetle I had ever seen, or at least that’s what I told him. He refused to move away, instead flying of further near the curtain and making himself comfortable there. It was then that I noticed him vividly. This weird creature had a pair of eye-like spots on his butt. Eeew! No wonder he didn’t get flattered.

Then, trying something different, I decided to sing to him. Not known to be the best singer in a million years, I relished in pleasure at having an audience to my songs, finally.(The last time I sang, I received a single slipper from some one on the road, my neighbour called the fire brigade and my brother took chloroform.)

So, I sang a paean of admiration for him. One, which I shall reproduce here.

Beetle, beetle, Oh! My lovely beetle,
Do you want me to hustle you into a bottle?
Get out of my room,
Else you shall taste my broom.
You look cute,
And a bit astute,
Get out of my room,
Or it’ll be your doom.
You are very pretty,
And have spots that look shitty,
But please, Get out of my room,
Else you shall never be a groom.

I shall never know what offended him so much, the last line of my paean or me trying to sing this in the tune of Beethoven’s 5^th Symphony, but right after this, this cunning fellow flew right at me. Yelping, I ran out of the room, coming back later and bringing with me reinforcements.

Namely, the broom.

Gently trying to coax him onto the broom, I employed reverse psychology on this hapless creature. I told him about the splendid prospects of finding a bride outside, told him about the doom he faces at the hands (or rather stomach) of a lizard inside my room and went on and on about the banes of staying here.

That’s when it dawned on me.

Heck, this creature has no ears. It’s bloody deaf.

Nearly giving up, I tried shooing it away with the broom. Then, I tried to switch off the light in the hope that he would go away. All to no avail. I used every trick known to mankind to coax him out of the window. But failure, failure and more failure.

Finally, I gave up. It annoyed me by constantly fluttering its wings to annoy me. But I ignored him over and over again. And just when I least expected it, that fellow just flew out of the window!

Heck, I could be an entomologist!