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Introducing the
roach gross-mobile

It wasn't the fact that a California graduate student had made a three-wheeled, knee-high cart propelled by a giant cockroach that grossed me out. We are used to college researchers pushing the edge of the silliness envelope to extremes.

Garnet Hertz, the University of California researcher, even admitted that his roach-propelled robotic cart was "something of a joke." Whether California taxpayers think it's a "ha-ha" joke or a "YOU SPENT OUR FREAKIN' MONEY ON A BUGMOBILE?!" joke remains to be seen.

Hertz claims he is simply pushing the theory of "insect mimicry" in robot development to the next level. By attaching a Madagascar hissing roach with Velcro to a computer mouselike track ball, the roach is able to "drive" the cart around the room. But the thought of a giant cockroach driving a cart around a room didn't gross me out. Finding out that Hertz buys his cockroach pilots on the Internet, now THAT grossed me out.

I went on the Internet, and sure enough, there are companies like Topline Wholesale Distributing Co. that allow people to buy Madagascar Giant Hissing Cockroaches, which can grow to the size of a small hamster, for about a dollar apiece.

Most Hawaii residents can understand owning a small hamster as a pet. I doubt they can understand raising a roach as a pet here, where cockroaches of any stripe are reviled.

"OUR HISSERS are of excellent size and very healthy," the Web site boasts. "Our customers receive roaches that are healthy, proven survivors! With Topline, you get the fastest possible start for your colony!"

I don't get it. Cockroaches are disgusting primordial pests. The fact that one happens to be larger than the rest and hisses like a punctured tire doesn't make it cute in my book.

You can order 15 adult hissers for $15.59, or 300 for a bargain price of $224.95. An 8-ounce package of special roach food is $4.95. If you want free-range roaches, I guess you can just let them roam around on your dirty dishes.

I'm hoping there is a law against buying roaches online and bringing them to Hawaii. I mean, if you can't play poker online, you shouldn't be able to use the Internet to bring yet more disgusting insects here.

Ironically or, I should say, thankfully, flanking the list of Internet sites on Google selling cockroaches are ads that say "How to Kill Roaches!" and "Get Rid of Cockroaches!" And none are selling roach robot carts.