Why is one room in my apartment in Oregon suddenly, almost overnight, filled with lady bugs? Before going to sleep last night I counted twenty-seven. All alive, all crawling the walls.

The fact that they are lady bugs keeps them safe from my thrown shoe, that and I’m moving out today, to a deluxe apartment on the ground floor. I don’t want to dirty the walls with their guts.

At 3:30am I was dreaming that I was in the dinosaur ride at Knott’s Berry Farm. That ride used to have a very dark section you’d roll through, where strings or something would be hanging down and would brush across your face. It would send shivers down the spine of the most brave.

Waking from the dream, I realized that while the dream had gone, the sensation was still there. I felt my face. Animals on my face. Bugs. After freaking out and flailing a bit, I turned on the light, expecting to see lady bugs. No. Different kind of bug, a bug I’ve never seen. I expect there were at least three on my face. I kill them all, not as punishment, but as prevention. I don’t want to have this happen again in my sleep. They don’t die easy. I employ a combination of pressure and heat, squeezing them between thumb and forefinger sandwhiched between a plastic bag, then pinning them against the lens of my halogen reading light which has become quite toasty.

I sleep uneasy until six, when it’s time to wake. I think I’ve got the flu or something, or maybe some disease these bugs transmitted through my snoring mouth in my sleep, because this morning I’m a wreck. All body functions have adopted anarchy, and are acting in complete dischord.

I can’t find any sites on the net that can help me identify this bug. I’ll have to post a picture here to enlist the help of the three of you who read this site.