Last orders

One of the things I enjoy doing most in life is taking a crafty kip in the van in the middle of the afternoon. It hurts nobody – unless I happen to stretch out and find there is a spanner or errant lunchbox underneath my frame, which can make a snooze very uncomfortable indeed – and makes the day go by just that little bit quicker. It also means I have the energy to stay up a little later, which means I don't disappoint any of my friends down the local of an evening.

Recently I was enjoying a pre-nap sandwich when I noticed a small bug crawling out from between my iceberg lettuce and the mayonnaise spread thickly across my wholemeal bread (wife's orders).

Now, I'm no jelly-kneed prig when it comes to munching down on some of nature's less attractive beasties – I have eaten haggis and jellied eels, after all, though not on the same plate – but I did feel my stomach turn when I thought of how many of this little fella's compatriots I may have unwittingly sucked down into my guts.

And with the creepy-crawly being pretty small in terms of the whole size thing, there's every chance I could have swallowed a dozen or more of the tiny creatures, completely without knowing it. This got me thinking.

What if I've been doing this same sort of insect-swallowing thing for days, or even weeks on end? Just how many of these things could I have crawling about inside my stomach and other sensitive areas, without a jot of permission from myself?

Could they have formed their own small society inside myself, with complex systems of social interaction, elections for representatives, a system of currency or goods exchange, and holidays for all but the most essential of workers? I closed my eyes and visualised just how such a covert society could exist inside the stomach and intestines of just one man. (In this instance I am just talking about myself. But you could easily consider insect societies existing inside the internal bits of other people – maybe even you!) I imagine the scenes down there would be reminiscent of the television programme 'Lost', except the stranded people would be insects, and they probably wouldn't all arrive in one go – and definitely not on a plane.

As they arrived, one by one or in groups, they were initially confused, not knowing where they were, or why there was a polar bear walking around. (This is something that has confused my doctor for years). I imagine they would have made rudimentary shelters out of the build-up of kebab 'meat' I've been storing for years, glued together with the nicotine gum I have been accidentally swallowing in recent times.

Eventually roles would have been allocated. You'd have one small insect who was a doctor or something, another one who was the bad guy and was always nicking stuff and not being a team player, a weird old guy who was actually nice, and a hot babe insect, walking around in a bikini all the time, maybe swimming occasionally in my gastric juices.

They'd realise that help wasn't coming any time soon, so they'd have to form committees to forage for food, and teach each other their respective languages. (I imagine there are a variety of insect languages. Why would they all come from the same place? If, by some quirk of nature, they all happen to speak some kind of universal insect Esperanto-type language, they wouldn't have to bother with teaching each other. But I find this highly unlikely.)

So I thought long and hard about the colony of insects starting a new life in my guts, and in some strange way, it made me proud. That may sound a little strange to you, but, being a man, there is no way at this stage of evolution for me to become pregnant, so this little group of plucky sandwich-creatures is the closest I will ever come to having another life created inside me.

In fact, in some ways it would be even more sophisticated than your run-of -the-mill human pregnancy. Not only would these creatures grow and enjoy a hectic social life inside me, they'd most likely reproduce themselves, meaning my stomach was home to an active and healthy ecosystem. Would it be a Darwinian 'only the strongest survives' scenario? Or would the brighter parasites flourish? How many years would it be before they had built their first computer, and were able to email me from inside my own body? These, and many other exciting thoughts went through my mind as I made my way home.

Insect/man conundrum

The trouble was, I couldn't stop thinking about the possible dangers that having a colony of pioneering insects inside your stomach could pose.

While it was quite an honour in many ways, I got to thinking that if the insects were really as successful as I imagined they would be, there'd come a point where overpopulation became a major issue. And with space becoming tight, at what point would I become more insect than human? What would the critical mass of insect life be before I was tipped over the edge?

Would it get to a point where I ceased metabolising in the normal human way, and started taking on the form of an insect myself? Would it be very much like that film with Jeff Goldblum where he has lots of energy for a while but eventually becomes disgusting and everyone hates him?

These were the imponderables I pondered. Then I slept for a while, and then I pondered some more. I thought about all the things I'd miss if I became more insect than human. How would I use the toilet? And can insects get served at a pub? Do they even like the taste of beer? (They'd probably have to, mind you, if they intended spending any serious amount of time in my stomach.)

Eventually I decided that it probably wasn't worth the risk. The thing that swung it, in the end, was the fact that I would be letting my clients down if I allowed myself to become more insect than man. No matter what my skills were, they probably just wouldn't accept that an insect-man could do the installation and maintenance work of a standard installer, and in the end they'd be the ones to suffer.