It Probably Pays More Than Teaching

Seems like only yesterday I was telling you about my recently diagnosed ailment, the symptoms of which are the lack of sensitivity to heat and cold, and the inability to hear noises emitted by classroom electronics. Thank the Gummi Mary, this ailment does not affect Mrs. Hillbilly Mom's second job, Acting District Entomologist and Disease Specialist.

A polite young lady approached my desk this very morn. She removed her shoe. And the other one as well. "Look at this. What do you think it is?"

"I don't know...a bug bite?"

"Yes. A bug just bit me."

"Does it itch?"

"No. It hurts. And look. I've got another one here on my heel." It was under the area covered by the back of her shoe.

"I don't know what to tell you. Maybe you need to show the nurse."

"What kind of bug would leave a mark like that?"

"A mosquito?"

"It wasn't a mosquito. It was a little bitty bug."

"A flea? They're tiny. But they usually bite in a pattern of three. And you just have one on each foot."

"What else?"

"I don't know. I'm not a bug expert." Bitee went back to her desk. Five minutes later, she was back at mine.

"Here it is. The bug." She held it between her thumb and forefinger.

"Get that away from me! It looks like a flea. It'll jump."

"I want to save it. I know! Can I have a piece of tape?"

"Yeah. You might want to take that and show the nurse."

"I want you to get on the internet and look it up, to see what kind of bug it is."

"That's going to be hard. There are millions of bugs. I don't think I have time to find the exact one. But it looks like a flea."

"Why is it in here?"

"I don't know. They don't normally live on bare tile floors."

"Am I going to get sick? Do they carry diseases?"

"Oh, I don't know...the bubonic plague comes to mind..." I stopped short of calling it The Black Death, and explaining how it ran rampant through Medieval Europe.

"Well. I don't want to get sick. They don't itch. They burn."

"See the nurse when she gets here."

Yeah. Now I'm stocking my room with exotic parasites, feeding them with the blood of my captives. Right? Isn't that scenario more plausible than that of Bitee walking through her lawn on the way to the car before school, across ground where her fowl and mammalians frolic?

Mrs. Hillbilly Mom. A Jill of many trades. But not exactly a bug master.