Dear Vice,
I learned a new word the other day. Pidocchi. That's Italian for lice. A few weeks ago I got stupid drunk at this boat party in Treviso, Italy and after jokingly trying to get this teenage girl to jump in the river with me I found myself naked on the bow surrounded by a throng of onlookers and a gnat-storm of paparazzi. Sure, I jumped in the river, splashed about for the audience, climbed the rocks back onto shore and dressed only to continue the night at some pseudo-discothèque where I stank like river water and some friends told the DJ it was my birthday: "Buon compleanno Americano!"
Anyway, I got home around eight or nine in the morning and slept until eight or nine in the evening when I woke up and took a shower. In the shower I noticed my chest was covered in dirt, little brown flecks of… dirt. Dirt that wouldn't wash off, dirt that moved when I picked at it.
Bugs! My chest hair was invested!I spent the evening picking these critters out of my chest hair—not an easy task as they have claws and strong ones at that.
But even then I wasn't sure it was lice. So I did some research. I googled "bugs in chest hair," and the first hit was something like "sucka, you got lice." And my Italian is disgraceful—even after six months I haven't gotten much further than posso avere—so I once again turned to google for a translation of "lice."
Pidocchi.
The pharmacy man, a bald, bespectacled guy with tiny, tiny hands, was very kind and gave me "the lotion," as opposed to "the shampoo" because the lotion was stronger. Then he looked sternly at me and said something of which I understood less than half: something about being careful with it around my penis because this shit is strong. Anyway, that was weeks ago, like I said, and still I got lice. I must have used that can of aerosol foam half a dozen times now, fucking bathed in it, and I'm still picking these fuckers out of my chest hair, my armpit hair, and yes, my pubic hair.
My friend Adam said, "Shave it off, dude. Just shave it all off."
But if I do that they win. And I can't lose.
Fuck, even as I write this I can feel those parasitic critters sucking the blood out of my crotch and crawling around in my beard.
For a moment I thought about sleeping in my vacationing roommate's bed just to see if when he came back he'd tell me that he had lice. Because I don't think he would. But I didn't. He's an asshole, but maliciously giving someone lice seems a bit immoral, even for me.
Lice have a stigmatism to them, like back in grade school with those screenings and tests, "Today is Lice Day!
I told a few people, some friends, but I tried not to let everyone I worked with know about my parasites. Of course, there's this one girl, an Italian co-worker I've been flirting with and I didn't really want her to know I had lice, but at a bar not long ago she said she heard I had bugs.
"No no no no… I had bugs."
"What kind of bugs?"
"Nothing serious," I said, landing my hand on her waist. "They're gone now."
But another Italian co-worker overheard and chimed in with, "Pidocchi."
The girl was immediately terrified and tripped over herself stepping away.
"But I killed them, I killed them all," I said.
"I don't think so," she said. "Those bugs are hard to kill." And you know what? She's right goddammit.Andrew Smith
Treviso, Italy
I learned a new word the other day. Pidocchi. That's Italian for lice. A few weeks ago I got stupid drunk at this boat party in Treviso, Italy and after jokingly trying to get this teenage girl to jump in the river with me I found myself naked on the bow surrounded by a throng of onlookers and a gnat-storm of paparazzi. Sure, I jumped in the river, splashed about for the audience, climbed the rocks back onto shore and dressed only to continue the night at some pseudo-discothèque where I stank like river water and some friends told the DJ it was my birthday: "Buon compleanno Americano!"
Anyway, I got home around eight or nine in the morning and slept until eight or nine in the evening when I woke up and took a shower. In the shower I noticed my chest was covered in dirt, little brown flecks of… dirt. Dirt that wouldn't wash off, dirt that moved when I picked at it.
Bugs! My chest hair was invested!I spent the evening picking these critters out of my chest hair—not an easy task as they have claws and strong ones at that.
But even then I wasn't sure it was lice. So I did some research. I googled "bugs in chest hair," and the first hit was something like "sucka, you got lice." And my Italian is disgraceful—even after six months I haven't gotten much further than posso avere—so I once again turned to google for a translation of "lice."
Pidocchi.
The pharmacy man, a bald, bespectacled guy with tiny, tiny hands, was very kind and gave me "the lotion," as opposed to "the shampoo" because the lotion was stronger. Then he looked sternly at me and said something of which I understood less than half: something about being careful with it around my penis because this shit is strong. Anyway, that was weeks ago, like I said, and still I got lice. I must have used that can of aerosol foam half a dozen times now, fucking bathed in it, and I'm still picking these fuckers out of my chest hair, my armpit hair, and yes, my pubic hair.
My friend Adam said, "Shave it off, dude. Just shave it all off."
But if I do that they win. And I can't lose.
Fuck, even as I write this I can feel those parasitic critters sucking the blood out of my crotch and crawling around in my beard.
For a moment I thought about sleeping in my vacationing roommate's bed just to see if when he came back he'd tell me that he had lice. Because I don't think he would. But I didn't. He's an asshole, but maliciously giving someone lice seems a bit immoral, even for me.
Lice have a stigmatism to them, like back in grade school with those screenings and tests, "Today is Lice Day!
I told a few people, some friends, but I tried not to let everyone I worked with know about my parasites. Of course, there's this one girl, an Italian co-worker I've been flirting with and I didn't really want her to know I had lice, but at a bar not long ago she said she heard I had bugs.
"No no no no… I had bugs."
"What kind of bugs?"
"Nothing serious," I said, landing my hand on her waist. "They're gone now."
But another Italian co-worker overheard and chimed in with, "Pidocchi."
The girl was immediately terrified and tripped over herself stepping away.
"But I killed them, I killed them all," I said.
"I don't think so," she said. "Those bugs are hard to kill." And you know what? She's right goddammit.Andrew Smith
Treviso, Italy