The Spider Wars

Steph asked a good question--are we able to play outside? Now, either she's terribly jealous of our amazing weather here in the valley, or she was wondering about what I've come to call The Spider Wars.

If you read my last post, you know I was a little shocked to find out about the whole black widow/brown recluse spider issue. When I posted about my neighbour's find (the honkin' black widow in her sandbox) on my facebook, many of my new valley friends and neighbours replied that they'd had similar experiences. This was, in fact, normal.

I was, and continue to be, a little freaked.

But, I'm powering forward. I'm being brave. But watchful.

To that end, I spend a considerable amount of time checking out brown recluse spiders (since I've now seen a black widow in real life.) Do me (and yourselves) a favour: DON'T google images of brown recluse bites. It's nasty. You can't unsee that.

But, at least now I know what the little suckers look like.

Knowledge is power, and all that. So, I was able to pretty positively identify the huge brown beasty spider that came running out from under my bag of mulch the other day as a brown recluse. Awesome.

The end result of all this is that I refuse to hide out in my house, since the darn things often find their way in, anyway. I will simply do what every other southern woman seems to do. I'll pull myself together, touch up the mascara, and declare, "With RAID as my witness, I'll never fear spiders again."

(I'm channeling my inner Scarlet, here, folks. While I'll never claim to be a true southern woman, I like to adopt some of their finer qualities. Think Steel Magnolias, and biscuits.)