The World Wide Web is at MY HOUSE!

Spider Web that is!

I got home around 9:30 p.m. the other night. I worked late - I was not in the mood for much. Arriving home at night when you live "out in the boonies" (this is a term - I checked) can be a scary experience. There are coyotes, foxes, skunks, and any number of wild animals that you can think of if you are scared enough and you put your mind to it. There are also spiders - and we have TONS!


Alan and the kids had gone to bed before I got home, and they only left the utility room light on. Okay, I don't like the dark either, but particularly when there are spider webs in every oraface of the car port and the wrap-around porch (yeah - the spiders wrap around it too). Of course, the utility room light was enough to illuminate the huge spider that chose that moment to dangle DIRECTLY IN FRONT OF THE UTILITY ROOM DOOR!
This is a link to a picture of the kind of spider that was waiting for me. The eriophora species. Non-aggressive (whatever)

http://www.usq.edu.au/spider/find/spiders/192.htm

Anyhoo - as you can imagine, there was no FRICKIN way I was going in through that door. I waited a few seconds, while not taking my eyes off of it but patiently expecting it to go away (i don't know where to - I just wanted it to go). I fumbled into my purse for my phone and called HubbyD's cell (we have no land line). No answer - straight to his voice mail. OMG!!...

So, while not taking my eyes off the spider, I called Alan's number again.....ELEVEN TIMES!!! Geesh! So, I decided - I'll just get back in the car and honk the fricking horn until he wakes up. Screw what the neighbors think - this is a life or death situation - THERE IS A SPIDER in the ONLY lighted doorway to the house. Sure, I could take the porch around to either the front or back doors, but I already know the location of all the webs around the porch and there is no way I'm walking through an UNLIT web of WEBS!

So, I turn around to head back to the car, when I suddenly realize I have been standing with my back to not ONE, NOT TWO - but THREE of THESE:

http://www.arachnology.be/pages/Orbweb.html

The one on the far left - yellow and black.....insert collective chill here.

Well, now, what would any other arachnaphobe do under this kind of ill duress? I decided my only choice of action was to try and alert our 85 pound great pyranese (I believe I have mentioned Ally before) - her barking seems to be the only thing that wakes Alan up at night.
So, I whistled - and I can whistle pretty loud, let me tell you. Our cats came from out of nowhere - I didn't even know they were still outside! Ally heard too and she stood up to the window of the back door - panting and whimpering. I'm yelling at her to "BARK - BARK YOU DARN DOG!!! THERE'S A SPIDER!! TIMMY FELL IN THE WELL!!!" which is, I am sure, in direct conflict with what I normally yell at her which is "STOP BARKING!!!"

By then, the cats were all mewing and rubbing in and out of my legs, their tails tickling me (much like a spider might, were it crawling on you). I was really beginning to freak out, so I called HubbyD's phone about 12 more times (he actually had 18 missed calls this a.m. - so whatever that would make it). No answer. Spider still dangling in front of the door, my dinner sitting right on top of my esophagus, Cats meweling, and Ally standing in the window, panting like a doofus and cocking her head and looking at me while I stood there crying! What could I do? My heart was racing, I was trying to get the cats off me and keep my eyes off all of the spiders, who I am sure were circling for the attack.

What finally saved me was the spider itself. He seemed to have gotten tired of his aimless dangling, and shimmied back up his web rope to his coveted spot above the doorway. I decided to just make a run for it, because I couldn't keep an eye on the spiders behind me at the same time, one of which had apparently felt threatened as he was bouncing in his web (they do that ya know - really creepy) - so I RAN!! Had the door not been unlocked, I am positive I would have just broken right through the lock!!! I knocked Ally outta the way (her 85 lbs were no match for me, or my momentum) and slammed the door behind me. I had to look up and make sure the spider was still there. He was, and I'm quite sure if spiders could laugh, he would have been slapping all 8 knees.

Once inside, I decided to call Alan's phone again just to see if it was working and where he might have left it sitting. I heard it ringing from the dark living room, but just as I started to go towards it, the upstairs light went on and Alex, my son, came out of his bedroom yelling "What is that freakin' noise????"

I yelled back "IT'S YOUR DAD'S FRICKIN PHONE THAT APPARENTLY HE CANNOT HEAR!! I'M SURE GLAD I DIDN'T HAVE TOO BIG OF AN EMERGENCY!!!"

Alex asked "WHAT HAPPENED" - very worried sounding, my sweet boy.

I said "SPIDER HAPPENED!!!"

Alex, who is just as much of an arachnaphobic as I am said "OMG - HOW BIG??" - the sympathy was much needed at this time.

"Who cares how big - it could have killed me and ya'all wouldn't have known until you bothered waking up in the morning to my web covered, ridgid body" It can happen - check this out: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/213294/Man_Killed_by_Pet_Spider_Eaten_by_Creepy_Crawlies

Needless to say, Alan was not amused that I woke him up to tell him that he nearly caused my untimely death by not waking up; nor was he sympathetic to my spider plight. People with NO 'real' phobia's just cannot understand.