A Surprisingly Sane Blog

Or maybe it’s rational, I don’t know.  I mean, it certainly makes sense, anyway.  The irrational part is that it’s never been an issue before.

But dammit, the last week or so, I have been getting non-stop heebie-jeebies just thinking about Black Widows.  It’s gotten so bad that I actually had a semi-nightmare last night about ‘em.  There was one in the house, but it was so fast that I just couldn’t figure out where it was hiding… and then I’d see it jump like crazy-ninja-warrior-spider and land on me.  Ahhhhh!

Now, I’m the girl who has spent all but three years of her life in the desert.  I’m used to rattlesnakes and poisonous bugs and cute little lizards and a multitude of freaky-looking spiders.  If you stay away from them, they won’t bother you.  I grew up having to chase javelina out of my backyard so that they wouldn’t eat the pathetic attempt of potted African Daisies that my dad was growing on the porch.

It’s just part of living in the desert.  You have to co-exist with these creatures.  They technically have more of a right to be here than we do.  At least they’re native.  My pale-skinned ass may have been born here, but my European-mutt and Cherokee blood will tell you I don’t really belong.  That’s a topic I’m going to touch on later, though.

I even have a pet tarantula sitting on the counter.  Okay, so it’s preserved in a heavy dome-thing to be used as a paperweight.  But still.

I am not squeamish about bugs and spiders.  I scoop them up bare handed and toss them outside.  It’s a fact of life if you’re going to live here.  Even my Julie-bug can point to pictures of desert spiders and tell you which ones are dangerous and which ones she just thinks are yucky.  *Pffft*.  Chicken.  She’s such a girly girl.

But Holy Mother of God, pray for my sinning self, I have suddenly just started to freak out about Black Widows.

You wanna know why?  I have a *really* good reason.

So my aerobics teacher, the delightfully tacky one… not to be confused with Nazi Lady… got BIT BY ONE a couple weeks ago.

Yes, bit.  On her lower back, just above her teeny-tiny little toned butt cheek.

She said she has no idea when or how it happened, but one Saturday morning while she was working out, she felt a sharp pain coming from her lower back.  No one knows if that’s when the spider bit her (*shudders* ohmyfreakinggosh it must have been hiding in her work-out clothes), or if that’s just when the bite started to hurt.  So it’s not like she was being a moron and poking it saying, “Look at the pretty little spider!” or anything.  It just maliciously decided to snack on her.  Evil motherfucking spider.

But she had a really bad reaction to it. That bite turned into this massive infection and she ended up in the hospital for a surgical procedure twice to drain it.  It took her a few weeks to recover, and she is still experiencing some pain from it.

And yet, that adorable little Barbie-doll of a human still manages to bust out the weights and the step and run us through atrocious work-out routines that make me feel like I’m going to fall over clutching my chest from those freaking chocolate-crack-artery-clogging cookies I made this week.

At least I’m going to have buns of steel, right?  A nice, toned ass that can help me run far, far away from the mean evil spiders that are out to get me.

Okay, so whatever the case, though, I am now apparently terrified to the point of having nightmares of these darn things.  I’m not used to being afraid of something like this.  How do I cope?

To make matters worse, there’s this magnificent Black Widow that lives on the neighborhood mailboxes that I stare in complete awe at every time we pass by it on our nightly walk with the dogs.  She’s just beautiful.  We’ve talked about spraying her with bug killer, but we just can’t bear to do it.  I guess no one else on our street can get themselves to do it, either.  She’s minding her own business.

But holy crap, what if she follows me home and tries to devour me in my sleep?

Current Mood: Alarmed

This entry was posted on Friday, April 3rd, 2009 at 10:37 am and is filed under Confessions, Daily Ramble. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.