Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Spiders are Scary

I stumbled today upon the blog Hyperbole and a Half. And I found this:

Spiders are scary. That is a universal truth. I don't know why. I don't need to know why. All I know is that when this:




comes crawling across the floor at me, my brain interprets it like this:










That is a spider with a swastika and the words "I KILL YOU" carved into its flesh and it has knives and guns strapped to its legs. That's how scary spiders are.

Now - This is my laundry room:


It’s in the basement. Of a mid 1840’s house.

Built out of stone.



I made myself a rule the day we moved in. I don’t do any laundry after dark.

For over two months I followed this rule religiously.

But yesterday at 8:30 p.m. I realized that there were clean clothes sitting in the drier. I debated with myself briefly. Then I flipped on the basement light and headed down the stairs.

(More H & 1/2)
...Blind optimism and impulsivity often cause me to ignore logic and instead
make decisions based on a hopeful projection of what's going to happen next… In hindsight, there was absolutely no reason to believe that it would not happen.
But for some unknown reason, I ignored a lifetime's worth of cautionary evidence and pranced merrily onward into the unavoidable consequences…



I made it into the back room of the basement and had the drier door open before I saw it. Charles (who is well aware of my self-made “never after dark” rule) had heard the creak of the basement door opening and came to investigate. He reached the top of the stairs just as I hit the bottom step. “GET OUT OF MY WAY!” I screamed as I came at him, taking two steps with every bound.

Dutifully, he moved out of my way. As I stood there in the dining room, trembling and out of breath, he looked at me with exasperation and said, “Why did you do that?” Good question. Then, dutifully, he went down to the basement asking, “Okay, now where did you see it?”.

The spider (and I) lived through last night’s encounter. But since then Charles has (dutifully) emptied a container of this stuff on all of the basement walls and windows:





For now, I think we have enough clean laundry to get us through about four days.


(And if you haven't already, do head over to Hyperbole, it's quite entertaining stuff.)

4 comments:

  1. From one who knows and understands... the spray will serve you well ! : ) They do seem to be a little tiny bit less scary as I age, though it does depend on the size of them... ugh... enough for now ! Pleasant thoughts and dreams, Aunt Barb

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ken has some wonderful stuff that he sprays around the outside perimeter. I rarely see those horrible creatures. I think the fear is genetic... ask your Mom about when she lived in the Kalb house, and I lived a block away in the trailer. It took the two of us to get brave enough to kill one of those because your Dad was not home. As aggravating as your uncle can be sometimes, I remind myself about his pesticde license to get rid of those creatures and realise I can live with alot... as long as I do not have those! And your Aunt Barb is having delusions if she thinks they get less scary with age, she might need her glasses checked. LOL Aunt J

    ReplyDelete
  3. I knew I liked you. We were meant to be related. I hate bugs.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I found another way to get rid of an unwanted eight legged friend who is in your face as you are on top of ladder with a heat gun... hit with what you have... first they try to run, then shrivel as the heat gun seems to better on the spider than it does the paint. How you and Alice have survived the last winter of work is beyond me. My porch trim is kicking me around the block. BUT, the heat gun took out the spider! Aunt J.

    ReplyDelete