By popular demand (and because no one gave me a better topic to blog about) I'm going to tell you a little story about my friend Fred...
Once upon a time there was a little spider named Fred, except Fred wasn't actually that little. He had a nice fat brown body, long spindly spider legs, and hairy toes just like a hobbit. In fact, Fred was quite fond of the Lord of the Rings trilogy having watched it as a spiderling through a window one breezy summer afternoon. Inspired by his hero, Sam Gamgee, Fred set off to explore the world and eat insects (which Sam didn't do but rabbits were just too big for little Fred to bring down).
Fred chased palmetto bugs and roaches, he trapped flies and smaller spiders. Fred grew and grew and grew. Until one day when Fred's adventures led him to a dark, scary, loud place... the land of the GIANTS!
Noise echoed around the dank caverns. Traps were everywhere, meant to ensnare and kill the unwary spider. All around him hung portents of doom... empty webs. But Fred was brave, he soldiered on. He knew he wasn't a mere web-spinning wannabe who would wait passively for prey. No, Fred was a true Huntsman spider and he would hunt, even in the land of giants!
For days he wandered, dodging the GIANTS! and the traps until at last he found the deep, dark land of plenty. A crack between a cabinet and the wall of the giant's house was home to a thriving civilization of bugs that peacefully co-existed there. Fred moved in and soon arranged the society so that bugs would bring him tribute. Everything was perfect until there was a great gurgling sound and the wall became oppresivly hot. The smaller insects dropped like... well...flies. The others fled. Incensed, Fred went to go see what was destroying his wonderful new home.
And that's how I met Fred, as he peered into the shower trying to figure out why the hot water heater was burning his backside.
Yup, I turned around in the shower and saw a giant spider clinging to the glass door of my shower. I screamed, he ran, it was all very exciting. Later he climbed out of his hiding place behind the towel closet to watch me brush my teeth.
And that's the story about Fred, the spider that lives by my shower. I caught him once and put him in the kitchen, but a few weeks later he was watching me shower again. I've come to terms with it. Living with spiders is a small price to pay for having a mosquito free house, and I'm pretty sure Fred isn't poisinous.
I'm also pretty sure Fred is a female because her/his side, but all spider are male by default until proven otherwise.
I have two arachnophobics in my house. Fred would have died.
ReplyDeleteThe cats have gotten very good at directing my attention to any spiders foolish enough to come in so that I can kill them before the others see them. Hubby will kill them as fast and hard as he can as that's how he handles his arachnophobia. Our daughter, however, curls up and shakes for several minutes and then avoids the area as much as she can for a few days.
Personally, I don't like spiders and prefer to use some object to kill them. I've been known to capture them and turn them outside but if I see the same sort of spider twice, it dies. The cats won't eat them, I guess they taste bad.
At least this place has fewer spiders than our other place did. Can't get away from them one hundred percent.
Right now they are doing renovations above us so we're getting the bugs that were in the walls down in our place. So far it's been mostly carpet beetles which the cats like to play with but won't kill and eat. We don't have carpets so I am discovering all the places where the walls and floors have gaps.
Fred just hangs out on the wall, and that doesn't bother me. The ones that creeped me out were the blind spiders that hatched the first summer we were here. They were oblivious to everything and would walk over you because, hey, they were walking and you were in the way. It took us about a month to kill all of them.
DeleteI enjoyed your cute story about Fred, Makes me feel so much better about Jackie, (Trevyn named her that because she looked like a Jack-o-Lantern to him). But she was outside, although we did feed her wasps we captured from the bush in the front if she was having a slow day. Folks around here thought we were pretty strange!
ReplyDeleteA couple years ago, I had multiple spiders called Fred who lived in my room. Then my Uncle named his kid Fred and it got a little awkward. They now go by Bob or Charlie.
ReplyDeleteThere is also a Kangaroo that eats on the front lawn at my parents place. His name is George. Although these days I think there are a few George's that take it in turn. :)