What to get the girl who has everything?

Ok, maybe I don't have everything, but much like my approach to buying shoes, I don't often find myself wanting for much. However, I stumbled upon this today and I must say, I'm tempted.

I'm tempted more by the idea of ridding my house of bugs relatively pain-free. However, being the avid bugophobe that I am, even zapping bugs from arms-length might be too close for comfort.

I once came home to find a giant stink bug perched precariously above the door to my apartment. I stood a great distance from the creature, pondering what to do. Various ideas raced through my head. Given that we lived on the second floor at the time, I contemplated what it would take to scale the wall, climb onto the balcony and somehow break into our apartment. I entertained the idea of just waiting it out - me vs. the bug. I thought about calling for backup, but was not confident that any of my friends would arrive in a timely manner.

So I resorted to the following: I took my shoe off, lobbed it at the bug, hoping to dislodge it from it's temporary home. I wasn't trying to kill it, necessarily, but just wanted to scare it enough so that it would fly or crawl away. If it chose to crawl, I would just avoid it until I could safely enter my home. However, if it chose to fly, my plan was to flail about hoping that it wouldn't land on me. So I threw shoe #1. Much to my displeasure, not only did I miss the bug, but I also failed to even make it flinch.

Freakin' bug. You won't get the best of me.

So I took off my other shoe and tossed it as well. Again, failure on two counts: the bug was still alive and still sitting right above my door. So I sat. And I thought. What's a girl to do? I was shoeless, and I couldn't get into my apartment, nor could I break into it successfully.

I probably waited outside for a good 5-10 minutes. Nothing. No movement. No sounds. No progress. Maybe it was dead? Could I take that chance? Images of the bug getting caught in my hair flooded my mind. Even as I type this, I can feel the fear welling up inside me once again.

After what seemed like an eternity, I decided that I would make a break for it. I readied my keys, forming a battle plan in my mind. I mentally rehearsed the quickest way to open the door, run inside and slam it shut behind me, making sure that I wasn't followed in by the monster.

I counted to 10, said a quick prayer, and made a break for it.

SUCCESS!!

I was safely inside in my bug-free apartment. A little while later my roommate came home. As I saw her entering the apartment, I motioned to her to get inside quickly, as the bug might still be waiting to pounce on its next unsuspecting victim. She looked at me like I was crazy, which wasn't really anything out of the ordinary. Then she asked me what the heck I was doing and why my shoes were outside. I sadly recounted the whole story to her, and wouldn't you know it, the bug had totally disappeared. So at that point, I was a barefoot blabbering idiot. Hey, at least I'm consistent :)

Wow...that was quite a tangent. Needless to say, I'm not sure that the bug vaccuum would even work for such an extreme case any of the following: Acarophobia, Arachnophobia, Apiphobia, Entomophobia, Insectophobia, Isopterophobia, Mottephobia.

Wow. That's a lot. For more on phobias, check this out.