Dateline: New York City. Quit Buggin’.

As if I hadn’t crapped on The Marrakech Hotel enough, there is still one other thing that I feel must be mentioned. The three empty cans of industrial strength Tri-Die insecticide that I found in my room’s trashcan:



Upon checking in and finding the above discarded cans, my first reaction was one of revulsion. I mean, what did it mean to be in a room where not one, not two, but THREE full cans of insect killer needed to be used? Was this a hotel room or Turkish prison?

But then I felt thankful. Hey, at least the hotel management was putting up some kind of fight. Not letting the little bastards just walk all over them. Or better yet, all over me.

Finally, I felt disrespected. How could the person or persons who had emptied those cans not have at least thrown them in another trashcan, one where the next guest (namely, me) wasn’t going to find them? In the laundry room, the back office, hell, in the kitchen! Anywhere but in the very room where they had to be used!

As for the insects in need of being kept in check, for the duration of my stay, I assumed it was likely nothing more than a roach problem. In most buildings in Harlem you can’t swing a dead rat without hitting a live roach. It was only after I got home that I dug a little deeper into just what Tri-Die is used for.

The company that manufactures it claims it can be used to kill a multitude of insects. Some were no-brainers, the run-of-the-mill kind of stuff you might encounter just about anywhere. But some of the others made me glad I waited til I got home to look it up. The idea of some of these freaking things crawling around my hotel room would have been enough to send me over the edge:

Ants. Fair enough. Ants are everywhere. I would think that most types of poison could take care of those little dudes.

Bedbugs. Now that’s a different story. I want no part of bugs of any type being in my bed at any time. Whether I’m in it or not. Have you seen what properly motivated bedbugs can do to a person?



Bees. What? Bees? Who the hell has bees in their hotel room? In the park, sure. The backyard, no doubt. Maybe a stray one gets in through an open door…but if you ever reach the point of having to use three cans of insecticide to bust up an infestation INDOORS, you have some major quality control issues.

Booklice. I don’t even know what this is. And frankly, I don’t want to know. Sounds pretty horrible. I’m not even going to do a Google search to locate a photo. Some things are better left unseen. (On the plus side, there wasn’t a book to be found anywhere near my room, so maybe I was destined to dodge that bullet from the outset.)

Boxelder Bugs. These guys sound like something that medieval barbers might have used to bleed people or drive out demons. I might have my demons, but I prefer them over something called a Boxelder Bug any day of the week.

Clover Mites. They actually sound kind of cute. Like the next group of breakout characters that might be featured in the latest Pixar animated feature. Until you see one.



Cluster Flies. Single flies are bad enough. But, like mullets at a NASCAR race, when they start cluster, nothing good can come of it.

Earwigs. Do I even need to say anything here?

Firebrats. At this point, it almost seems as if the manufacturers of Tri-Die are just making stuff up to either: a. Sell more product through wildly-exaggerated product benefits that nobody will ever be able to call them on, or b. Making up outrageous-sounding bugs just to see if anybody’s even still reading the label at this point.

Scorpions. Sure. Exactly what you’d expect in just about any hotel room. In Phoenix.

Sowbugs. Now it’s just getting ridiculous. Sowbugs. Sowbugs? Who in the world looks around their place and thinks, “Hmmm…I need to get something to get rid of these sowbugs.”?

Stored Product Pests. Thanks for the generalized specifics. They might as well be claiming that Tri-Die kills “You know, those white-ish kind of bugs that have the long feeler thingies? You know, with all the legs? Sometimes they’re inside? But sometimes you might see them outside too?”

Powder Post Beetles. No idea.

Looking back on it, I probably shouldn’t have reacted so negatively at the discovery of the empty cans. Because now all I can say is thank God for Tri-Die and the men and women who see fit to use it on my behalf. Keep up the good work, guys.