Brown In My Pants

1/31/06

It is estimated that seventy percent of homes in Missouri have Brown Recluse spiders.

I just thought I'd attempt to horrify you into a coma. I've found several of these little arachnids around my homes in my tenure on this planet and today I found another one. For reasons which will become apparent, this particular encounter was the most frightening. But first, a little science lesson.

The Brown Recluse is one of only two potentially dangerous spiders in this area of the country, the other being the more famous and sexier Black Widow. Humans almost never die from brown recluse bites unless very young or maybe if ganged up on by likesome crazy spider mob or something. The bite can, however, cause something more horrifying than untimely death. Namely, horrific disfigurement. Occasionally the bite of a brown recluse (oh, by the way, you wont feel the bite for several hours) causes a nasty little condition known as a dead, sinking fucking hole in your body. Yeah...if you happen to hit the venom jackpot you can look forward to hollow ulcers surrounded by necrotized flesh around the bite. Imagine a tiny, disgusting volcano in your flesh and youre just about there. Good luck with the casual sex.

The great thing about this fascinating little creatures is that they don't make webs and like to hide during the day so you never really know if they're around until you see one. Or if you suddenly develop new and interesting open wounds scattered about your skin. Another lovely piece of information sure to keep you awake at night is that brown recluses, well known as the hobo of spiders, like to take up residence in places like your shoes, clothes, bed and the inside of your rectum. (Yet to be verified.) In order to avoid having venom injected into the inside of your skin, it's recommended that you shake out your clothing before wearing. You'll just have to balance the off chance of being punctured by fangs with being a pants-shaking lunatic performing interpretive dance in your bedroom.

Say, did you know that over the course of an average lifetime you're likely to swallow eight spiders in your sleep? See you in your nightmares!

Today, in a moment of uncharacteristic domesticity, I decided to do laundry. This probably had more to do with the fact that I was down to a sweater vest and one pair of duct tape pants. (Thats another story.) Going through my change jar for quarters, I was treated to a brown recluse spider roughly the size of a Volkswagen emerging from within the change pile like the grasping claw of Death. To my credit, I did not shriek or wet myself; I very calmly slammed a DVD case down onto the change vase to trap him inside, retrieved a small jar from the kitchen, scooped the thing up and secured the lid with a speed that would make a ninja flinch. Only then did I succumb to a full-body shudder accompanied by a noise not unlike that a whooping crane afflicted with the Clap might make.

What the fuck was he doing in there?! What could possibly be in a change vase to interest a spider? I'm left with two inescapable possibilities, neither of them pleasant.

1) The brown recluse was trying to rob me.

2) It had learned to gain sustenance from coins.

As you might guess, number two is decidedly more frightening; the idea of some kind of large, mutant arachnid that eats metal does not make one confident of his own superiority in the Universe.

More terror-inducing still, the vase containing my change is a mere eighteen inches away from where I normally masturbate. Images of ravenous spiders with a hankering for cock flash through my head. And I can just imagine trying to convince a woman to overlook the developing wound on my pecker:

"Nah, baby, its just a sinking ulcer from spider venom--hey where you goin, baby?"

If all of this has taught me anything its that I shouldn't do laundry.