Last week, Thomas, a cicada from the westside, signed up for a number of different dating apps to help him find someone he can mate with before he dies in four to six weeks.

                           “I tried a few and finally signed up for one year of online services with Matches.com,” says Thomas.  “Although I know I’ll be long dead and gone by then, I just couldn’t turn down that great 50% off deal.”

                 But Thomas has not had great success thus far with any of the online dating apps.

                “Then problem with these dating sites is that people misrepresent themselves,” Thomas says.   “I had one women, who was supposed to be thirty-five years old, but in the background of her photo, I saw a black & white TV set and a transistor radio sitting on a kitchen table.  And next to them was a copy of LIFE magazine.  She was clearly old as dirt.  And I know dirt, having lived in it for the last seventeen years.  And the other problem is that I believe in being completely honest with people.  Most women I communicated with were looking for a long term relationship.  When I tell them that I’m just looking for a two to four week courting cycle, which would lead to sex, hopefully impregnating her.  After which, I would go off and fly around blindly for a week or so, until a die.  Might have time to check out the French Open or a few episodes of The Wire, but I doubt it.  For some reason, my forthrightousness turns women off.”

                         The life cycle of a Cicada is a strange one.  For seventeen years it lives underground as a nymph, feeding off of tree roots, sap, and the occasional burrito.  Then it crawls up from under the ground, sheds its outer casing, has sex, dies.  All in a span of two to six weeks.  If Thomas is unable to copulate with a mate soon, he says he has a back up plan.

                      “I’m going to donate my jizm to the sperm bank,” Thomas says.  “Hopefully, they can keep it frozen for the next seventeen years until, hopefully, my soulmate comes along.  Or… on my last day, Im gonna crawl up to the tallest branch of any tree, where I’m going to masterbate into a wall of cicadas and let the wind do the rest.  Hopefully, something will stick.”