Spider Killer

Before I moved to the ranch, I had to have someone kill spiders for me. In the city, there were a few, mostly in the windowsills and on the fire escape. There was a big 'security light' (which wasn't effective, I kept the car doors unlocked, so the crackheads could ransack my car weekly without breaking the windows)

The security light attracted mayflies off the river. Mayflies have about a twenty four hour life span. They're alive long enough to swarm, mate, then fall back into the river to be eaten by fish. Nice life, eh? Be born, fuck, die. Sometimes it appeals to me, the whole uncomplicatedness of it.

Again, digressing. The mayflies attracted spiders. The spiders grew HUGE. I mean just enormous. Perish the thought if a fire ever broke out from July to October, as these monster spiders spun huge webs to catch the mayflies all up and down the fire escape, and I sure as hell wasn't going to run thru them. During those years, the live in boyfriend was there to kill the spiders who got into the apartment (usually the only job the boyfriend ever held for any length of time)

When I moved out here to the ranch, spiders were the last thing on my mind. It was November. And I was too worried about ghosts in the house to think of spiders (I'll save the ghost blog for another day) Spring came, and with spring, came little yellow/green spiders. EVERYWHERE. Not as big as the city fire escape spiders, but what they lacked in size, they made up for in quantity. In the shower, in the bedroom, IN THE COFFEEMAKER (a bad, bad thing to enroach on my coffeemaker) they were just everywhere. And after a couple times of uncharacteristic girly running and squealing, I just started to kill them. And after I tired of killing them, I just let them alone, shooed them along (unless they were in the coffeemaker, instant death, no question)

Summer came. And with summer came the big spiders. BIG. GODDAM. SPIDERS. Seriously. Black and yellow striped ones, brown striped ones, big gray ones. Holy hell, it was like Spiderpalooza out there. I could come home from work at five thirty, no spider webs, no spiders on the porch. Go back out at six, do errands and be home at eight thirty, and have three spiderwebs between the parking space and the porch, and one big spider taking a break on the lawn chair (drinking a beer and rolling a doob) They certainly kept busy. And as long as I remembered where the webs were (and NOT to walk into them) we were all right. I'll leave the outside ones alone. (Shifting into organic mode) They eat bugs and that keeps my garden happy. Mostly.

Sometimes they aren't happy with their outside digs, and come inside to check out whats in the fridge. Thats when I get 'em. If you're a spider, and you cross the doorstep, you're dead meat. Especially if you're in the bathroom. Tuesday night, I came upstairs to get ready for bed, and sitting beside the toilet was a big brown striped spider. All brown spiders are brown recluses to me. I've seen the pics different blogs have posted of brown recluse bites, and I still have visions of those infected, festering wounds. So I take no chances with brown spiders. Mr. Big Brown in my bathroom got worked over with the business end of the toilet plunger. Repeatedly. Until he was nothing but a smear with legs on my linoleum. No mercy, baby. It's a short stroll from the bathroom to my bedroom, and whos to say Mr. Striped Brown isn't going to get all cozy in my bed? Ew. The horror of it all. That makes me all oogy just thinking about it.

Mr. Striped Browns nephew came a-looking for him the morning. Rambling across the kitchen floor, Barney Mangosteen saw him first and alerted me. (Good boy, Spider cat!) I swooped in for a closer look, and indeed, it was a smaller relative of the bathroom smear. Having no flip flop (the premier spider killing weapon) I had to make do with a wad of paper towels. Now Striped Brown, Jr. is a smear on a half a roll of Bounty. I'm not taking any chances about actually TOUCHING the damn thing! Bleeech. All is well at the ranch. The rampaging Striped Browns have been vanquished (for the time being) and I can get on about my day.