Spider Phobia Dreamin'

All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey. I went for a walk, with a gas-powered leaf blower.

The sky was all purple there were people runnin everywhere.

Next thing I know, I'm in the house with the leaf blower- blowing under the stairs and sending dander all over the place.

You know how dreams are, it's like your brain gets bored while you are sleeping and so it messes with you. And whats really weird is how you just accept whatever is going on in a dream. A kangaroo in the bathroom? I'm cool with that.

But as I walk through the living room, there are cobwebs on the rafters containing spiders the size of tennis balls. I shut the blower off so as not to create a spider snow-globe effect inside the house, but it is too late. A big spiderweb begins to trampoline, and the spider tries to hang on, I am against the wall, and I watch amazed as the spider begins to bob up and down more, giving him more force, and on the next upswing he vaults toward me.

In an impossible dream-produced reality the spider arcs across the room towards me. I duck, but the web catches my hair, and he wraps around me like a tetherball. He is by my feet and momentarily stunned (as am I!), but I know it's him or me- fight or flight- and I can't fly in this dream, so I go to crush him- with my hand!

In dreams you sometimes make stupid desicions. Just like in real life. Well, as I move in to smash him, he turns and grabs my fingers and I feel the pain of a sting. Thats when I wake up and notice my hand is tingling before it all fades away. I lay there for a minute wondering why I'd torture myself like that. What strikes me as weird is how my hand was tingling from the dream. It's fine now. I guess Morpheus was right!

The mind makes it real.

You better watch what you say- you better watch what you think- it's the first step to reality!

Be careful what you wish for- your mind may make it real.

And if you have an overactive imagination- your mind may serve you some insanity.

I laugh at my overactive imagination as I put the clothes on that are in a pile by the bed.

Then my imagination conjures up an image of spiders using the night as cover to build spider-condos in the clothes on the floor.

Now they are in my waking eye!

what matters most to spiders

You may think this may not have anything to do with spiders- but they asked me about my spider phobia! Check out two of my friends who produce a great podcast about what matters most! Congrats Vicky and Jen on your 100th show!

Enjoy What Really Matters - 100 Times!

There are now 100 simple ways to make an impact on the way your family values it's time with two moms who have taken “mom networking” beyond the next level. What Really Matters, the popular podcast show that focuses on simplifying life, is celebrating it's upcoming 100th show (release date 10-22) with some of their favorite past guests. The Sneaky Chef, Dr. Romance and HGTV organizer Jamie Novak are just a few joining Vicky Thornton and Jen Rehberger, along with great prizes offered from Pampered Chef, Klutz, King Arthur Flour and more, all in honor of their success. Their weekly show on VickyandJen.com focuses on hot family issues and simplifying life, chatting candidly with their guests about commonly sought after information in an entertaining, yet informative way. It’s talk that matters!

What They Do

Co-hosts Vicky Thornton and Jen Rehberger, casually interview a wide variety of guests, from chefs to professional organizers, life coaches to doctors, and television personalities to best-selling authors. Audience suggestions help guide the focus of each new show, offering listeners "personal access" to high profile guests, sharing their unique questions and comments before and even after the show. There is no lecturing, just “candid” questions and conversation, helping busy families stay well-informed about current family topics. Vicky and Jen learn, laugh and grow along with their listeners, sharing a companion page on vickyandjen.com with additional information, including photos, related articles and websites, helpful books, tip sheets, music spotlights and more. For more about Vicky and Jen, visit the About Us page.

How to Tune In

What Really Matters is part of the new generation of news and entertainment media, and is a featured iTunes podcast in the Kids and Family category. You can listen to the audio show from your computer or any portable player. The accompanying website, www.vickyandjen.com, is the ultimate parent connection to important family topics, with companion pages for each podcast, simple family recipes, kids activities, and a blog. A weekly newsletter, Small Matters, shares quick tips, new resources and products, upcoming show topics and regular contests - all keeping the mission of making life simple, so you can focus on what really matters.

Spider Traps

Yes, it's October and it's Spider Season in Seattle. This is when the hobo spiders come out of the walls and floor vents and scurry across the floor to find the flesh of a human. This is when I put spider traps in every corner of the house. I use about 75 at any given time.

For those of you that don't know -a spider trap is a gooey triangular box that goes along the wall and catches spiders as they emerge from the writhing nests in the frame of the house. Based on the "roach motel" premise, spiders check in, but they don't check out. Sometimes I decorate the traps to look like a motel 6, so the spiders on a budget can get stuck too.

In a sort of twisted style of origami, you fold the trap together- making sure you don't get any sticky stuff on you. I don't know if it's glue or super poison resin, but I try not to touch it. I wear a suit of rubber when I am putting them out.

I also wear the suit when I patrol the house for captured spiders. I pick them up with 20 foot tongs and peer into the housing to see if I got one.

I am always afraid a spider will fling it's payload of lethal spider babies at me as I look in, so one can't be too careful.

I hate when one is in there and still alive. As I squint to see in, I see a monster in it's trap, squinting back at me. YOW! He's built a whole world in there- biding his time like a prisoner in a cell- waiting for parole. I can barely keep from dropping the box and running outside to burn the house down.

The trouble with spiders is they are very hearty and can survive for days in there. Once I picked up a trap and two were in there, still alive, and they WERE FIGHTING. I believe they were fighting for the right to murder me. The human is mine- no he's mine, no, no, no, he's mine. (Paul McCartney, Micheal Jackson song reference here)

Other times I've picked them up and observed a spider graveyard in here. I wonder how many were able to escape by walking over the dead bodies of their fallen friends. Then I picture them back in the hive, sharpening their fangs- declaring loudly "I will avenge thee, brother!"

Oh, I've seen em escape from a trap too. Once a particularly big spider, the size of a construction workers hand walked into a trap. I stared in awe as it observed it's situation and slowly pulled up one leg, reached over, pulled another leg up, and made it's way out of the trap. As it left the trap, one of it's legs ripped off, leaving it embedded in the glue, but it kept going- like the end of "SAW."

He trickled away- like "thing" from the Addams Family, every so often glancing back at me, searing my face into his memory, for the day will come, when he gets a little spider prosthetic leg and will find me sleeping in my bed, surrounded by a ring of out-facing spider traps, and he will carefully walk past them, like Indiana Jones in that temple from the first movie, then, climbing up my bedpost, hobbling across the sheets, till he stands above me, watching my faint breathing, remembering the past, the "Kill Bill" music playing as the camera focuses in tight on his eyes, then he reaches into his spider back-sac, and slowly pulls out a large bottle of glue...

Oh my imagination got away with me.....

Happy October Spiderphobes!

ode to the Orkin man

Oh, Mr Orkin man, with your uniform and boots.
You spray liquid death onto the spindly evil
that lurks within the house of my roots.

You recognize the telltale signs of bugs in my dwelling.
You kill the roaches on contact
and keep those ticks from swelling.


Your boots walk my floors but never leave residual..

You wear a helmet, but I'm not sure why.
You have a backpack of pesticide.

which you pump
and pump
and pump
and shoot behind the refridge-ual.

(FREE VERSE)

Your job is to eliminate the pests,
with a license to kill
an entomological James Bond,
there's one on the windowsill.

The day that you are scheduled
I rejoice for I surely know
that soon twill be the end of
those spiders that plague me so.

I dance with glee and revel in that chemical smell

that will make the arachnids no longer.

I pray to the creator (who made em in the first place)

That the toxins won't mutate them and make 'em stronger!

(HAIKU)
5- Van with plastic roach
7- tie wearing angel of death
5- this house has been cleansed

Ode to the Orkin man, with a bright gleam in your eye
You unpack your equipment and whisper softly:
"Die! Die! Die!"

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

vacuum battle

When I don't want to actually get NEAR the spider in a battle, I do what the generals do, use hardware. I get a vacuum cleaner and suck the enemy up.
.
EX: I see a spider scurry along the baseboard, I run and grab the VC and plug it in, all the while not taking my eyes off the spider. (gotta keep him on radar.) Then I put on every extension attachment so that I can stand 20 feet away.
.
Then I sloooowly put the nozzle near the spider and in a coordinated strike, turn it on and jab with the tip. I watch him shloop into the nozzle and then I let it run overnight. He may be hanging on inside the hose, like he's in a wind tunnel, so I gotta wear him down.
.
Then in the morning, while the VC is still running, I reach outside the window and vacuum up loose dirt to bury and suffocate him. Satisfied that I have created a spider morgue inside the VC bag, I then stuff paper towels into every opening.
.
Then I drive to the Costco parking lot dumpster, throw the vacuum cleaner away and get a new one that hasn't been defiled. Hey, sometimes -to save the village, you gotta destroy it. It's the American way.