Our mini garden

I've decided to plant some flowers and a few types of veggies this year.

Last year I started really early and I think overwhelmed myself.

We are keeping it simple this year.

Carrots, lettuce, green onions, spinach, zucchini, and tomatoes.

While cleaning stuff up I found this nasty little thing outside. Actually, it wasn't little. This spider was the biggest freakin' spider I have seen out here. I was sweeping some old leaves away from the corner of the house and he/she popped out and I think I went one way and it crawled back into the leaves. After collecting my wits I told Benji to go get Aaron. See, I am usually very kind when it comes to spiders... when they are outside. In the house is a totally different matter.

However, I couldn't come to accept the fact that this monster was living on the other side of my kitchen wall. Not happening for me. So back to calling for Aaron. I ask Benji to go get him. Benji tried multiple times to call for Aaron but Aaron didn't come. I told Benji to go yell at him and tell him "NOW!!", but still, no Aaron.

As I'm waiting for Aaron to show and realizing he's not coming I begin to threaten him with leaving him and Tennessee in my head.

I didn't want to leave the beastie in the leaf pile and leave and then have it crawl away. There's nothing worse than having a huge spider appear out of nowhere and then have it disappear.

At this point I went in the house and yelled for Aaron, who finally came to my rescue, but not without mumbling about how everyone in the house needed to grow a pair. I told him I didn't need to, I had ovaries and that was enough.

He went out to the ominous leaf pile and a teeny weenie spider crawled out. He looked at it, looked at me, and said, "That's what you called me out here for??".

"NO!!, Keep looking!" I said. I stood back about 5 feet waiting for the bugger to jump back out. I'm sure at this point I was letting off some sort of pheromone which was attracting every bug within a 5 mile radius. Aaron stood there with the broom slowly (methodically he says) brushing the leaves away. In my head he was supposed to go out there and start beating the pile of leaves like a mad man.

So there he was, he goes through the whole pile... just a few leaves are left. So far, no spider. He is looking at me as though I'm crazy. I'm standing there practically jumping up and down saying "It's gotta be under those last few leaves!! It's gotta be!! Get it! Get it!"

You might ask why I don't kill it. Well, for a couple reasons.

First, I HATE the way it sounds when they crunch. That horrible squishing noise is more than I can bear. In fact, I shudder thinking about it while I type this.

Second, it IS man's work. I am normally very open to men and women being able to do the same things. Killing spiders does not apply. If Aaron is not home and a big one rears it's head I will put a jar over it and wait for him to show up and fix the problem.

So there I am hiding behind Aaron staring at the last pile of leaves waiting for it to come out. Aaron brushes the leaves and WHAM! there it is. At this point even Aaron recoils a little and says, "Whoa! You're not joking... that is a big one!".

He kills the thing with my broom, to which I reply, "I'm gonna need a new broom".

Aaron then flung the dead spider away from the house towards the pavement. In years past he might have tried to shove it in my face real close to hear me scream, but he has since matured as I threated him badly the last time he did that. It literally smacked the pavement with a gross thud when it hit. The picture doesn't really do it justice, but that mother made noise when it hit the ground.

EWwwwwwww.

As the afternoon progressed I continued to plant my garden stuffs. My neighbors came home and I showed them the dead thing and whilst turning around and pointing to the general area that the beastie had come from ANOTHER one, BIGGER THAN THE DEAD ONE, crawled along the wall. We both just stood there and stared. My neighbor looked at me and said, "Uh, Is Aaron still home"??

It crawled down the drain so we weren't able to get it. However, I have some insect killer/spray that kills spiders (or so it says) that I sprayed all over the area we saw it at. I'd like to see it and know it's dead, but then again, I'm also thinking I'll be happy if I never see that sucker again. The body on the dead one was at least the size of a nickel. The alive one was even bigger- the body was at least the size of a quarter!! Not the legs... just the body!

The next day the dead one was gone. The ants carried it off for dinner.