How My Mind Works: The World's Perfect Couple?
Okay, while doing research I really had no right to be doing, I discovered the fact that in 2006, a woman called the Scorpion Queen held the record for holding a live scorpion in her mouth. Two minutes, three seconds, seven inches of venomous scorpion between the teeth.
That’s not the cool bit. Who placed the scorpion in her mouth?
Her lover, the Centipede King.
Now, these guys are serious. The Scorpion Queen – or so it was reported – lived in a house with 5,000 scorpions for 32 days. Her husband lived in a cage with a thousand centipedes for a month. (Though this gives me the delightful image of the Scorpion Queen, sitting in her writhing chitinous house, with her husband popping by from time to time, stepping carefully amidst the sea of stingers to bring in the tea.)
And, in 2006, they wed.
But then I wondered: are they still together? What kind of marital disharmonies would they face? I mean, clearly they spend a lot of time apart, what with their living boxed up with bugs all the time. One hopes they can manage to get past the inevitable conflicts that arise when one starts comparing the merits of centipedes to scorpions, and make it up with insect-filled kisses.
Alas. The Internet fails us here, as I can find no update on the Scorpion Queen and her fine, verminous husband. They have dropped off the ‘net, having gone dark – a thing that seems supremely appropriate, yet is maddening in its absence.
I need to know how they are today. Have they managed to grow their love like the larvae in their walls? Are they still magnificently into multi-legged creatures? Has the Centipede King become some sort of hipster, having declared centipedes to be so 2006 and moved on to stinkbeetles? Or are they cuddling among the bugs, wreathed in many-legged bliss?
Please, please tell me they have not divorced. I could not bear the news.
For if the Scorpion Queen and the Centipede King cannot make it work, what hope is there for the rest of us?
This made me smile. I hope we find out what has happened with then since.