Arachnophobia

I hate spiders. Anything with more than four legs is just creepy. Tonight, I had just finished up my homework, and I was going to put my books in my bag for the next day. I pick up my bag, and underneath is an enormous brown spider. It took everything I had not to throw my bag and scream like a little girl. I took a step back, grabbed the heaviest book I could find (no problem with all of my nerdy technical books around. I book on programming for Windows NT and Windows 95 should do quite nicely). I gave the book a little toss, and to my chagrin I see the abomination squirt out to the side, narrowly avoiding a textual death. Fortunately for me, he froze a couple inches from the book. I slowly lifted it again, and with much better aim this time succeeded in ceasing the little abomination's life. Score: Book 1 / Spider 0.

Do you get these spiders in your house? Someone once told me they were called wolf spiders, but I think it is just a common house spider. Either way, I'm going to kill them on sight. I've seen them range in size from half an inch across to fully almost two-inches. They are brown, and look hairy. They never seem to have a web, and they are frighteningly fast across the carpet when they get spooked. I see them down in the basement from time to time. I've found several dead already, which suits me just fine, but I'm kind of curious why they have chosen my house as their final resting place.

So now I'm totally freaked out, thinking every little brush against my leg is one of those eight-legged cretins scurrying past. I guess my only consolation is that they don't seem to spin webs or climb very well, so I don't have to worry about one of the big ones dropping in on me from the ceiling. I've had that happen with smaller spiders in the past while I'm playing a video game in the dark. I'm sure that Jenn is going to catch me on film sometime, flailing around like sissy, scared to death that I might have actually touched a spider.