Crazy Stuff I've Seen in Dallas, Cicadas will Rule the Earth Edition

So you know Cicadas?  Noisy bugs that live all over the world (more than 2000 species of them!), have a crazy long lifecycle (up to 17 years), and are pretty dang huge as adults?  Well, wouldn't you know also, that as part of our recent move to Dallas, we'd choose to move into a dwelling situated LITERALLY ON TOP OF A NEST OF NYMPHS, just  in time for them to complete their 13 year life cycle and hatch all around us?  Yep, not making that up...

Yeah, yeah, this isn't the first time I've seen Cicadas -- I've seen both adults and the exuvia (the discarded husks -- why yes, I am a teacher, how did you know?) before in Georgia.  But these suckers are EVERYWHERE here right now!  Which led me to make this video, hilariously narrated in the background by me, trying to "sing" the Jaws theme-song, but quietly enough so the neighbors won't hear and think me demented.  What those freaky little husks really made me think of was Alien, not Jaws, but I don't know the theme song to Alien, so oh well.  Also, you get to say hi to my dog at the end. 

For the record, Cicadas don't really freak me out -- I totally let one live peacefully on my back steps for about a week before it molted... I just was impressed by the number of exuvia, and then they reminded me of horror movies, and here we are!

And here's an amazing time-lapse of a Cicada molting over the course of two hours...  It's a lot like butterflies, only grosser and thus cooler...  I'm bummed that four years of Kindergartners missed out on seeing this!

"Cicada molting animated-2" by T. Nathan Mundhenk - Edited version of File:Cicada molting animated.gif. Licensed under CC BY 2.5 via Wikimedia Commons