The crickets are up to something

This all started last Friday night.
I'm sitting on the track at my assigned high school game and, after finishing adding up stats, am waiting for the band to wrap it up. As this is going on, a cricket hops over toward me and flies into my lap. Now, I've never seen a cricket fly before. They jump like madmen, but not fly. And this one was definitely flying, at least in that one-legged man hopping kind of way. It just kind of fluttered up in a half circle and came back down. Very weird-looking.
So I shoo it off, but it comes right back and lands on my leg. Shoo it off again and it lands in front of me, hops once, turns around and just sits there. For, like, five minutes. Just staring at me. Halftime ends, I get up and the cricket hops away down the track.
Later that night, I stop for gas after work. Go to grab the squeegee to clean my windows and there's about 50 crickets hanging around the garbage can. Some are in, some are out, some are on the concrete. Like a giant cricket party.
A couple nights later, different town, another gas stop. And more crickets. Same as the night before, probably 20 or 30 of them hanging around the gas pump. Two of them are even having a drag race, running the length of the gas pump together. I've never seen that many crickets together -- or any crickets ever, for that matter -- at a gas station.
Two nights later, I get home and there's a cricket on my floor. I've had roaches in the house before, but never crickets. This one is just there on my kitchen floor, not chirping, not moving. Just keeping tabs on me.
Then, this morning, there was one hopping around on my bedroom floor. I tried to catch it and toss it outside -- or maybe question it -- but it got away. I'm guessing I'll have another chance.
But why is nature's buffet item stalking me? I've always been kind to crickets. I don't stomp them or feed them to birds. If they're inside the house or office I walk them outside to freedom. Maybe they're trying to warn me about something, but what? Or maybe they're getting ready to take over the world and I'm the only one who can stop them. The first cricket was the messenger. The ones at the gas station were the rowdy gangs. And the ones in the house are the evil mo'fos.
Watch out for yourselves. This may be the start of an invasion.

 

You must be new to Texas.

 

If any of them look like this....



...your conscience is trying to tell you something.

 

I don't know about all crickets, but this one didn't find a lot of success at flying.



And yes, I am hell-bound in the proverbial handbasket.

 

I was thinking the same thing.

 

I'm not in Texas, but am in the south, and have seen plenty of crickets before. These ones this past week have just been acting awfully strange.

 

The crappie are biting, boy. Time to go fishing.

 

Another cricket that's no stranger to Texas.

But I did have to wipe some Leinie's off the screen for that one.

 

What, this isn't the "All-Purpose Cricket" thread?

This really should be moved to Sports and News ... oh, wait, crickets in Texas? Not news. But they were at a sporting event so I guess it can move.

 

An update on cricket madness...

Yesterday I was walking to the manger's office in my apartment complex to pay the rent, and in the grass I spot a black splotch, about 2 feet across. At first I thought it was a charred patch of grass. When I looked closer, though, I realized it was several hundred dead crickets. They were stacked two deep. It was like some sort of mass suicide.
I'm telling you, there's something awfully strange going on here...

 

Stir-friend crickets?