Grasshoppers

Once, I was with a girlfriend driving south down the west coast of America. We were heading towards a town where we had decided to stop for some lunch. As we approached the town, we could see these strange brown shapes on the road and the pavements. We slowed and I saw one or two of these shapes move. We stopped and I could see the town was swarmed with huge grasshoppers. As big as rats these things were. We went into a little diner, trying not to step on any of the grasshoppers that were crawling along the pavement with us, into the diner when we opened the door. Our server told us the hatch happened like this every few years. Not regular, though. It could be seven years between a hatch, then two, then ten, and so on. Our soup was the same thick brown colour as them. When we got back into the car to leave, we had to open and close the doors fast to prevent one of these things jumping in. I can't remember the name of the town, but the last few days I haven't been able to stop thinking about it, or looking at this picture.