i'm sorry little spider

It's spider season again.

A couple of weeks ago we found a gigantic white tail (huge, absolutely huge. had to be a female) in one of the bedrooms. Not ours thankfully, although that reality didn't make all that much difference to my bedtime peace of mind, especially after I found a jumping spider in the bed when I changed the sheets. Usually we'll preserve the lives of spiders, but white tails do not fit in that category. Extermination is the order of the day. So Frank carefully flicked the white tail to the floor - but in an effort to spare the wall a gigantic smear, he failed to make a fatal blow. The white tail ran behind the cupboard and that was the last we saw of her for quite some time. Not nice. Thankfully while I was away last Thursday night, said white tail crept out of her dark hidey hole, Frank whacked her hard, and that was that.

So the white tail is gone, but other little creepy crawlies still abound. Tonight it was a ladybird larvae - how on earth it found its way inside I don't know! Last night it was a friendly jumping spider hanging around the kitchen sink. I did warn it, run away now or risk drowning, but it just crawled in between a couple of dishes and started licking up the remains of the meal. I picked up the dish, intending to flick it safely out of harms way, but unfortunately I flicked it into a puddle of water. Quick as I was to rescue it, the little fella never recovered. It crawled off to a corner, slowly curled up, and died.

Well I think it died. This morning it looked well and truly a goner... but tonight it isn't where I left it. Did it recover to live another day, or (shudder, shudder) did a giant spider come and devour it? I'm going with the resuscitation theory - the other option just doesn't bear thinking about!

another big spider

Discovered this one hiding behind the shower curtain while cleaning my teeth barefoot in the bathroom... which is better than discovering it hiding behind the shower curtain while standing naked behind the shower curtain myself I suppose.

Yes, that is definitely bigger than the last one. Unless it IS the last one after he ate a bit.

(Thanks again to Frank my heroic rescuer)

arghhhhhhh

Frank found this in the hall just now.

There was some screaming (on my part) and a mad chase up and down walls and across the floor (on Frank's part) before he was caught...

... and returned to the great outdoors!

Thank goodness he (because all scary spiders are male aren't they?!) didn't run across the bed as happened last year.

I'm wondering if maybe we shouldn't close the front door after all.

mad-spiders... it could be possible after all

Some time ago I wrote about a spider running in circles around my bathroom floor. At the time I questioned if it might be delirious. Do spiders suffer from mental illness, or (as one friend suggested) was the spider simply burned by the hot air I blew on it and hopping around in pain?

I don't know, but it seems that I am not the only person who wonders about such things! 'lucidiocy' pointed me in the direction of an experiment which uses web design to determine the mental state of a spider.

Enjoy!

revenge of the spiders II

(apologies for 3 spider posts in one week, but this was huge)

I've done reasonably well at moving on from Monday's spider saga. I didn't see the little beastie again, and no point worrying myself to death over something I might never ever see! Spiders move on and so does life. Get over it. Even Frank noted that I'd recovered well from my arachnaphobic episode.

So there we were this morning, enjoying the opportunity for an Australia Day lie in, watching clouds float past the window and feeling satisfied with the world. Suddenly Frank grabbed me and attempted to flick me out of the bed. I barely budged an inch so he made a second attempt at the flicking, at which point I started to complain about such rough treatment of his beloved wife.

It was about then that I realised Frank wasn't joking. He had seen THE SPIDER - the 3cm long spider. He had seen it in THE BED - moving my way and only millimetres from my body! His seeming violence was a brave attempt to save me from an almost certain spider bite.

You can imagine the rest of the story. I flew out of the bed faster than a flash of lightening and we set about killing the little blighter. Except we couldn't find him! Under the bed, stripping the sheets, in the ironing board cover, shaking the pillows... no where to be found! After two close encounters there was no way we were letting him get away this time. We kept hunting until I saw him scampering across the floor boards.

Whack! He is dead. True to my promise I did not torture, I killed.

Autopsy revealed an adolescent huntsman.

This whole incident has left my skin crawling... I'm just glad I didn't see it in such close proximity.

A poem to bring closure:

Little Miss Muffet
Sat on her tuffet
Eating her curds and whey
There came a big spider
Who sat down beside her
So she clobbered him
Hard with her tray

how to have a really bad sleep

Yes, I am still alive. I survived the spider infested bedroom, but only just.

I stayed on the computer as long as I could, but by almost midnight I decided it was getting a little bit ridiculous so I toddled down the hall. Well, I would have toddled except Frank had turned off the lights because they were keeping him awake, so I cowered along on tiptoe, expecting the squelch of a spider at any moment. No spider in the hallway.

After safely navigating my way into the bedroom I cautiously reached over and turned a lamp on. Again, no spider on the light switch.

Carefully, so as not to disturb any spider that may have clambered into a drawer for safety, I opened the drawer and removed a nightgown. No spider.

I shook the nightie out and... something fell out of it. ARGHHHHHHH. Nope, no spider. It was just a baby earwig. (Will you listen to me - 'just' a baby earwig?! It was so tiny it was almost cute and in comparison to a spider? Quite darling really)

Donn said nightgown and slowly pull back the sheets, all the time muttering to Frank and asking if he's sure there's no spider in the bed with complete disregard for his slumbering state. No spider, but I wouldn't really know as I wasn't game enough to look.

Gradually, ever so slowly I fell asleep but it must have be after 1am before I dropped off. (That is the exaggeration of a spider crazed mind for sure. I never take that long to drop off!)

And then every time I moved (and sometimes when I didn't) I jumped awake - certain that the spider had just run across my leg. No spider? I don't know - I didn't dare look.

It was a long night and I am alive, but I feel less than so. Thankyou for your thoughts!

revenge of the spiders

It's after ten and I really should be in bed, but I just don't want to go there. Not that I'm not tired, it's just that a spider jumped out of the bedclothes this morning.

You read right - A SPIDER JUMPED OUT OF THE BEDCLOTHES this morning! Not just a friendly little jumping spider, not even a creepy daddy long legs - a 2cm long, reddish brown, hairy number that hitherto I have been unable to identify though I suspect he snuck in two nights ago when the front door was open and it rained outside.

This little creature has hung like a spectre over my whole day - running across my feet, dangling from my hair, tickling my arm, lurking in dark corners, jumping out of drawers. Of course, when I go to catch and destroy him, there's no trace of him and the spectre dances on across my mind.

Today's event caps off a couple of interesting spider incidents, one involving a jumping spider that I unwittingly tortured in a most cruel way.

The little fellow, decorated with a cheerful yellow stripe, was trying to walk down the side of the oven. Except the oven was on and it was burning his little feet, poor thing. He kept swinging out from the metal surface to escape, but, unable to maintain his position in midair, returned over and over to the searing heat of the oven. Soon he gave up and scurried back to the stove top where I waited, stirring a pot of stew. Momentarily defeated, he dropped himself a few centimetres from the stove overhang and curled up into a ball. Of course I blew hot air on him (how could I resist?) and he set off to prance around on the side of the oven once more. Poor little thing - he was obviously in pain, but my soft spot for jumping spiders does not extend to search and rescue. I let him be. Eventually he figured out that if he jumped far enough he would land on the side of the cupboard, which was not as hot, and there he sat until I turned the oven off, the furnace cooled and he could safely scamper wherever he liked.

This is rather a cute spider story in my opinion - 'arachnoid triumphs over trial'. The happy ending almost fills one with a warm glow...

Not so today's story. This makes me recoil with absolute horror. Especially since it went from bad to worse!

I flicked the doona off the bed so I could change the sheets, and as you know, out jumped THE SPIDER. I gasped rather loudly and squeaked out a plea for help. Frank marched boldly into the room and together we peered under the dressing table - sure enough, there was the big, reddish-brown hairy monster crawling along the skirting board. We breathed a collective sigh of relief that it wasn't a white tail and Frank exited the room to collect an extermination device. I stood by the bed shaking, waiting for Frank to return and rescue me from the hideous sight. Frank reentered and bent down to kill the spider and....

... it was gone! No where in sight! As I stood cowering in fear, the little bugger had scampered away to freedom. We moved the dressing table, the laundry hamper, lifted the mat but it all to no avail. He could not be found. (Why do I always think of spiders as male?)

How awful! Even now I don't want to enter the bedroom. Frank may be sleeping soundly and safely, but what if the spider comes out and eats us in the night? Too terrible.

So as you go about your day on the other side of the globe, please spare a thought for me, asleep with the spider! If I don't post tomorrow, you'll know I've been carried off by the hoary beast.

(Is this revenge of the spiders? A spider revolt? A reddish-brown hairy beast sent on a reprisal mission? If so - I repent. I promise to never again participate in any form of spider torture. I'll just kill you straight out! I hereby commit to the humane treatment of all spiders within the four walls of my home. I'll also shut the front door every night, even if it is hot and muggy)