Fanged Fauna

I was sitting here consuming a rather floppy, but quite delicious piece of pizza just now, when a flutter of motion caught my eye. I looked quickly to my right and saw a flinchingly large spider frantically scuttling up a dropline that was suspended from a smattering of papers on top of my computer. That dropline meant that it had just jumped or rappelled after something--perhaps a carelessly flicked crumb of pizza crust--before scrambling back up to its hidey hole between some papers.

I like most spiders. I'll even pick up some of the bigger, more colorful jumping spiders to show the kids. But large, long-legged spiders, especially the ones that can run faster than I can, invoke a very intense fight-or-flight instinct for me. I watched where it went, and then tried to figure out what to do. It's leg span was about half-dollar size, and its sprinting speed made me think it was a wolf spider. So I didn't want to kill it. But I couldn't have it sitting there. Staring at me. Jumping down to attack every errant crumb I sent its way.

So I grabbed a couple empty CD-spindle lids to try and catch it and send it outside. No good. That skittery little booger dropped like a dart...ooh I'm getting shivers...right through a gap in the desk. And now she's down there somewhere--in the hinges and crevices of the desk--hanging from my mouse cable--lurking under the power strip--or on the leg of my chair--anywhere she wants to be. Sprinting like one of H. R. Geiger's aliens through the miniature ductworks of the garbage around my desk, just waiting to scurry up my leg or arm. I probably should've just laid waste to it when I had the chance, because as bad as my concentration normally is, I can't concentrate at all now.

::shudder::