Arachnophobia
Shamed by Jen's spring cleaning, I have been looking around the house with a heavy heart. Recent weeks have seen only the occasional cursory once-over with the vacuum as gloom and despondency rule. Even so, the cobwebs lurking overhead seem to have reached mythical proportions.
whatever you do, don't look up.
I should perhaps explain that the house in which Barbara and I live was empty for ten years before we moved in. As one of six near-identical cottages on the research farm where we work, it had become surplus to requirements when the farm staff numbers dropped, and latterly was used as a storeroom for all the junk and detritus that really should have been thrown away.
they're lurking up there somewhere.
Sometime during that ten years, the water tank in the loft had split, soaking large areas of plaster. The old wood-burning stove that was meant to be a source of heating, hot water and cooking for the house had rusted almost solid. The whole place was cold and damp and smelled funny. We could have it for nine months rent-free if we redecorated.
dusting? What's that?
The company replaced the stove with a boiler, fitted a new bath and brought the wiring up to an approximation of acceptable standards. We scraped, filled, washed and painted for about six weeks and everybody was happy.
Everybody, that is, except the spiders.
tasty
You see, they had grown happy in their damp, cold home over the years. Undisturbed and with a seemingly endless supply of big fat houseflies, they had forged their own little spider empire at cottage number three. Callously, we swept them aside, hoovered them up, drowned them down plugholes once more water-filled, covered up their favourite hidey-holes with plaster, painted their unhatched children into corners. Generally gave them a hard time.
But try as we might to evict them, they won't go away. And when we're not looking they weave webs of great size and beauty. And in the most unexpected places.
A fitting demise?
Then they go and die.
whatever you do, don't look up.
I should perhaps explain that the house in which Barbara and I live was empty for ten years before we moved in. As one of six near-identical cottages on the research farm where we work, it had become surplus to requirements when the farm staff numbers dropped, and latterly was used as a storeroom for all the junk and detritus that really should have been thrown away.
they're lurking up there somewhere.
Sometime during that ten years, the water tank in the loft had split, soaking large areas of plaster. The old wood-burning stove that was meant to be a source of heating, hot water and cooking for the house had rusted almost solid. The whole place was cold and damp and smelled funny. We could have it for nine months rent-free if we redecorated.
dusting? What's that?
Everybody, that is, except the spiders.
tasty
You see, they had grown happy in their damp, cold home over the years. Undisturbed and with a seemingly endless supply of big fat houseflies, they had forged their own little spider empire at cottage number three. Callously, we swept them aside, hoovered them up, drowned them down plugholes once more water-filled, covered up their favourite hidey-holes with plaster, painted their unhatched children into corners. Generally gave them a hard time.
But try as we might to evict them, they won't go away. And when we're not looking they weave webs of great size and beauty. And in the most unexpected places.
A fitting demise?
Comments
And I have a pathological hatred for spiders, which I suspect is a flipside to the arachnophobia my mum and sister have. I'll happily spend hours hunting one of the fuckers with a rolled up magazine if it dares enter my home.
The way I see it, I'm an agent of evolution. Those spiders with a genetic predisposition to come into my flat are slowly being weeded out of the gene pool without breeding, so future generations of spiders will be stronger - and less flat and smeared - thanks to a lack of desire to intrude on my space.
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