Arachnophobia

Last night I had a close encounter with a spider. Normally, this would not merit any discussion. In most cases, when I find a spider that has taken up residence in my house, I scoop it up and toss it outside to fend for itself. I believe the spider PR that they eat things we like even less than spiders.

But this was different.

My new roommate was big.

Really big. I looked into its eight eyes and I saw no fear.

To get this into perspective, we are not talking Clint Eastwood's Tarantula. But, we could easily be talking about an extra from William Shatner's Kingdom of the Spiders. This spider claimed Peter Parker as a dependent on its last tax return.

The spider sat in a plastic bin full of toys, mostly of the Play-Doh genre. I could not reach in with a shoe, newspaper, or other suitable blunt instrument as the spider was in a crevice between some containers.

So, I did exactly what a third world dictator would do. I gassed the S.O.B. More specifically, I sprayed it with a product cleverly called Spider Kill (note to producer: you must have the worst corporate web site in history). I have used this stuff, which quite literally smells like a used diaper, on my boat to control spiders. If left unchecked, tend to grow fat and ugly all over the place.

On the boat, I have grown quite accustomed to picking the critters up and tossing them overboard. Often, they are immediately gulped down by a bluegill or carp. But, I was not going near this thing. First, I am fairly certain it could bite. Second, I am also certain that it could jump up to my face, insert some sort of tube down my throat, and lay an egg that would eventually hatch into something that would burst from my chest, most likely while in court. While I would like to be like Lance, that means Armstrong not Hendriksen.

Having stunned the beast with chemical weapons, I took the entire bin outside and dumped it out. This allowed me to get a good look at it. Of course, the thing, like any good Alien, would not die. Rather, it started to scamper away. At which point, it was impacted by the sole of my shoe. May it rest in peace. I have since decontaminated the toys and the bin.

After extensive Google research, I have decided that the spider was a dotted wolf (Hogna punctulata) which "hunts by night and hides by day." Nice to know.

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