The other day I was driving back to the office after a meeting. The car radio was on, but I was spacing out. Then the DJ mentioned a statistic that caused me to pause and say, “Wait, what?” I didn’t quite hear, but it sounded like he said for every single human being on earth, there are millions, or maybe billions, of insects.
I was curious about what the DJ actually said. So, when I arrived at the office, the first thing I did was ignore a bunch of voice messages waiting for me, plus a load of urgent emails, plus the promise I made to call a client the moment I got back to my desk. Instead, I did what any responsible engineering sales guy with a to-do list a mile long would do: I did a Google search for earth’s human-to-bug ratio.
I was curious about what the DJ actually said. So, when I arrived at the office, the first thing I did was ignore a bunch of voice messages waiting for me, plus a load of urgent emails, plus the promise I made to call a client the moment I got back to my desk. Instead, I did what any responsible engineering sales guy with a to-do list a mile long would do: I did a Google search for earth’s human-to-bug ratio.
Depending on which scientific organization you prefer to trust, the answer is anywhere from 1.4 billion to 2 billion insects and other bugs per person. When I read that statistic, my first thought was: Eww, that’s a lot of creepy, crawling critters on this planet. My second thought was: I don’t feel so bad anymore for not using a paper Dixie Cup to scoop up an insect on the floor and take it outdoors, as my wife encourages me to do. My method when seeing an insect in the house is a bit more blunt and final — especially for the bug. I still have to go outside, of course, to scrape bug goo off the bottom of my shoe.
When I did that Google search, a bunch of other bug-related fun facts appeared on my computer screen, most of which I really wish I had not seen. For example, I bet you didn’t know that human beings eat insects. And I don’t mean certain foreign cultures that incorporate insects into their local cuisine. I mean human beings who have no desire to eat insects, such as you and me. Every person in the U.S. unknowingly consumes, on average, one-and-a-half pounds of insects per year. At first, I thought bugs must be getting into the machinery in food processing plants, and then are mixed into hot dogs and other products. However, the insects that enter our digestive systems without us knowing it come mostly from fruits and vegetables. See? I always knew hot dogs were better for us than veggies.
When I did that Google search, a bunch of other bug-related fun facts appeared on my computer screen, most of which I really wish I had not seen. For example, I bet you didn’t know that human beings eat insects. And I don’t mean certain foreign cultures that incorporate insects into their local cuisine. I mean human beings who have no desire to eat insects, such as you and me. Every person in the U.S. unknowingly consumes, on average, one-and-a-half pounds of insects per year. At first, I thought bugs must be getting into the machinery in food processing plants, and then are mixed into hot dogs and other products. However, the insects that enter our digestive systems without us knowing it come mostly from fruits and vegetables. See? I always knew hot dogs were better for us than veggies.
Here’s another fun fact: the average human being has 1.5 million bugs living on him or her. When I first read that, I exclaimed, “Nope, not me. I have a bubble bath every day. I’m bug-free!” Well, I read a little further, and it turns out I am NOT bug free. Not even close. There are microscopic critters called “mites.” Mites are in the arachnid family, which means they are the cousins of spiders and scorpions. And mites are all over our bodies, feasting on dead skin cells. I get a really uncomfortable feeling just thinking about that. But not nearly as uncomfortable as the feeling I get when my mind wanders and I imagine my body being covered with 1.5 million spiders and/or scorpions. I’ve never been a big fan of horror movies, and I’m definitely not a big fan of the idea that tiny horror films are taking place on my body 24/7.
So, I think we all know what the moral of this story is: whenever you’re driving back to the office after a meeting, keep the radio off. And when you arrive at the office, dig into that to-do list rather than doing a nightmare-inducing Google search. Then at lunchtime, enjoy your peanut butter and cricket sandwich.
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