I really like autumn, in fact it’s probably my favourite season of the year, but the one thing that I really dislike about it is the spiders. They all start to come into the house about now, I know that loads of people have the same problem too. I’m not keen on spiders – no matter what size they are but at the moment they are humungous. And they always come out at night and gallop towards me. In fact I discovered that they didn’t like going over the flokati (I know, how 1970s of me) rug in the hall so I got a bigger one for the living-room because I was fed up being terrorised by spiders which always seemed to come from behind the TV corner and aim straight for me. The shaggy flokati wool certainly slows them down.
Today I had a horrible spider experience which I suppose I would have tweeted about if I were on twitter but I’m not – so here I go!
I went out to the garden to get some rosemary for the Sunday roast, and to reach it I had to put one foot into the herb patch. A couple of minutes after I put the roast in the oven I was aware that there was something in my hair. I thought it would be the usual bit of garden which had fallen on me. I put my hand up expecting to find a leaf there, I looked at my hand thinking ‘ How the hell did a bunch of brown leaves get into my hair’ – then they shot out of my hand and disappeared under the furniture, never to be seen again! Well not so far anyway, no doubt that huge spider will come back to haunt me.
I think it must have crawled or jumped on to me when I had my foot in the herb patch! That’s the closest encounter that I’ve had with any of those spiders but at least it all happened so quickly that it was gone before I could scream. The same can’t be said of the time that I saw out of the corner of my eye, whilst I was reading in bed, a huge spider gallumphing across the duvet. I didn’t scream once when I was in labour with my kids despite the fact that it was so awful that if I had had a gun I would have shot myself – but I certainly screamed when I saw that spider!
Not wishing to laugh at your misfortune but to compare screaming at a spider to not screaming during labour made me smile!
Jo,
I know, it’s crazy. Mind you screaming in labour would have done no good whatsoever because there were no midwives around anyway. Maybe they were to busy with the screamers! And I didn’t get any painkillers either. My advice to any pregnant woman is to just lie back and yell your head off.
Katrina!
So you have spiders galumphing into your house in September and we have the member of the animal kingdom I’m terrified of for some ridiculous, unknown reason–mice!
I scream my fool head off when I see a mouse streaking across the living room floor, the kitchen, wherever. They are due to be arriving any day now and I am on guard with traps and the like. It’s so funny, really. I’m not the least bit afraid of bears, coyotes (and hours from the Canadian border, ours are wolf-size), you name it, but those cute little mice terrify me.
In sympathy,
Judith
Judith,
I’m exactly the same but I jump on to the nearest high spot. I don’t know why because I’ve seen them run up an electrical wire no problem. Luckily in this house we’ve only ever had them in the attics and we quickly trap them. The noise they make running above the sloping ceilings is terrifying and last year I was woken with a hissing noise behind the bed and had visions of an escaped snake. It turned out to be a tiny woodmouse eating a plastic bag!
In our last house we had them in the kitchen as soon as there was snow on the ground. I stayed upstairs the whole day then, I could do that as I didn’t have the boys then. It’s the speed of mice that gets me and the fact that they’re incontinent, I think I would prefer bears too!
When I moved into my last house, a neighbour told me I shouldn’t leave my back door open or the mice would come in! I had visions of a little line of them marching in with red spotted hankies tied on to sticks over their shoulders! I actually like mice and don’t mind them as long as they don’t get into the food. One mouse can make a helluva mess though! I thought there was a whole regiment of them getting into a drawer once, but it turned out to be just one mouse with a great liking for the polo mints, I kept there!
Evee,
We thought we must have rats because of the amount of noise coming from the attic but it turned out to be a teeny wood-mouse. I worried about the population exploding if we didn’t get rid though so we trapped it. It felt like murder though because it did look cute close up and was all furry and fluffy underneath.
Terrifying – but hilarious! I still scream and run when I see a scorpion so thank goodness my new house doesn’t seem to attract them!
Anbolyn,
I must admit that you are living in a much scarier place, I don’t think I could cope with scorpions and what about snakes! I’ve just realised how lucky I am creepie crawlie-wise!
My personal nemesis would be flying cockroaches (life in the tropics, sigh).
But when I was a kid growing up in FL, we had these big spiders in the groves that scared the begeezuz out of me. I still cringe at the mere thought.
Pearl,
I didn’t even realise that flying cockroaches existed, what a nightmare. A cousin of mine lived in Hong Kong for a few years when her husband was in the army and the cockroaches there were as big as Mars bars!
I’m thinking that groves in FL might even have alligators in them as well as huge spiders. It makes me thankfull that we just have midges to put up with. Mind you, they have a very good go at eating you alive!
The flying ones are about 2″ long. I actually fell and broke my arm running away from one! Try explaining that to the ER intake desk. That woman still thinks my sainted husband broke it and I was just covering for him!!
No gators in groves – just in the drainage ditches and lakes. Don’t mess with them at all.
Pearl,
Poor you, mind you I’d just about break my neck to avoid one. I’m not keen on staying in London because I know that there are non-flying cockroaches there. I had the same problem when I was blowing up a balloon for the boys and it exploded in my eye, taking the kids to nursery later was great fun, the teachers obviously thought I was a victim of abuse!
I’m afraid I wouldn’t be visiting any lakes then, terrifying!