Adrienne DeArmas wrote:
>
> In a message dated 97-10-16 10:21:23 EDT, [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> > BTW, here in Florida they're called "Palmetto Bugs". Sounds like
> >  something the Tourist Bureau dreamed up, eh? <G>
>
> Not to digress, but there is a huge difference between cockroaches and
> palmetto bugs! Palmetto bugs are huge and they fly and they smell like grape
> jelly when you squish 'em and they only live in Florida - they never seem to
> cross into Georgia. Cockroaches are tiny, little, small, big, and huge, only
> some of them fly and they definately don't smell like grape jelly because no
> one here in DC seems to know what I mean by that!
>
> - Adrienne


Regional variants abound.  In Chicago they were (are?) called 'water
bugs' when I was growing up.  They were large (about an inch and a half
on average), black, shiny, terrifying, non flying creatures that on one
occasion got inside a closed(!) peanut butter jar that I kept in a
dresser in my room.  When I was at Indiana University, their cockroaches
were small and mottled brown.  I was told they were called 'German
cockroaches'.  They were all over, but especially noticeable when on
meal-less Sundays, students tried to use the stoves provided in the
dorms.  On warming up the oven, the roaches fled - they were living in
the insulation in the oven walls.

~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~

Ginny Cass
President, Board of Directors
Northern Rockies Heritage Center
P. O. Box 1884
Missoula, MT  59806-1884
phone 406-728-3662 (message)
fax 406-728-5963
email [log in to unmask]
http://www.nrhc.org