Oct 16 2008
in which creepy-crawlies creep and crawl
After coming home from Turkey, I had this idea that most bugs had lost their power to freak me out. To some extent this was true–flies didn’t bother me much anymore (not that they’ve ever seriously spooked me, but they annoy me less) and smaller bugs definitely don’t, especially since smacking them also seems to bother me far less (and by that I mean bug guts, not “OMG I just killed another living being!” Because mosquitoes don’t count). Even bees and similar nasties don’t seem to spook me as much, probably because I have never seen such huge wasps as I did in Turkey. I mean, seriously, these things were giant and they just wouldn’t go away, and nobody else except Janelle (who had her own bug problems, like the infamous Praying Mantis Episode) seemed to understand why giant black wasps with giant stingers might be a concern. Having them follow your boat around is also creepy.
Well, after today I guess I have to take it all back: spiders, for no good reason at all, still give me the serious wig. The one I saw today was large, as spiders go, and kind of speckly, and hanging from a very high museum ceiling, dangling next to a display case, and I couldn’t look at it without feeling my stomach try to climb out through my mouth. This one was even dead, I finally decided–all flattened-looking in its body parts with its legs sort of curled up, and definitely not moving.
I still had to get away from it fast before I really made a fool of myself–doing what I don’t know, but it couldn’t have been good. (Especially since museums probably don’t take kindly to grown-up students screaming “SPIDERRRRR” and running like mad.)
