When the swarm of flying ants was discovered, I calmly zipped into the kitchen, grabbed the ant killer, and with the press of a calm finger, reigned death upon them.
When my friend raced screeching from her house upon the discovery of a dead squirrel on the porch, I simply picked it up by its tail, walked back to the woods, and flung it.
And when Mookie puked worms, I calmly gathered the angel-hair pile of parasites and bagged them for the vet to examine while my husband was gagging in the bathroom.
I have buried (or flung) more dead bunnies, chipmunks, moles, squirrels, birds, and snakes than I care to remember, all of who were often in various, er, pieces. This is the result of living with cats who have been free to roam outside and embrace their predatory nature and return their prizes to our house with love, if partially consumed.
I'm not squeamish.
Except for spiders. There is only one kind of spider that is allowed to live in my house: little yellow ones that stay far away and seem to move with reasonable speed. We have many. We live in peace.
Wolfgang, a ferocious, enormous, hairy black serial killer, lives above my side door. On the other side of the glass. We had a conversation one day, through the glass. We agreed that he could live there, indulging his bloodlust. He could live there. Not in here. He accepted that he couldn't eat my face and I accepted that I was living with a psychopath attached to my house. But one who surely kept promises.
But then there were Mildred.
I'm not sure if Mildred and Wolfgang were dating, married, or just "friends." Maybe they didn't even know each other. Regardless, he had one side of the house and she the other. Outside.
After last year's ... incident ... Mildred and I had kept our distance. I felt we had come to an understanding. I didn't realize she was spending her time making "babies."
Yesterday, Mildred got her revenge. As I happily vacuumed up the front room, breathing in the first warm air of spring and basking in the rarely-seen Rochester sunshine, I felt life was just pretty darn good. And then it happened.
Awakened by the sound of my Dyson, an army of pissed off Mildreds came racing out of the wall, racing toward me like a platoon of psychotics, screeching in their high-pitched spider voices, intent on ... well, eating my face. That comes after they terrorize and torture me by crawling up my arms and legs and over my eyes and into my hair and ears. Forget water-boarding. Spider torture.
I'm not going to say my scream was bloodcurdling, but it did set off both dogs who were asleep out back, the poodle across the street, a baby at the end of the block, and a hamster three houses over.
I raced to the garage, to Jamie, who was certain some horror had befallen me (it had). He was unimpressed to discover I was "freaking out over a bug."
He went in to face the terror, a Spartan up against the Persians.
He found one beast.
One.
Which presents us with two issues:
1. He thinks I'm ridiculous.
2. They are still there.
I have not and will not return to the room. Ever.
Additionally, I have scolded both cats who spend a preponderance of time in that room and should have been all OVER eating the bugs. Explain how they can take care of 98% of the chipmunk population outside and haven't touched the Army of Black Death that dwells a mere two feet from their favorite bed.
And I swear, somewhere Mildred is laughing at me. Rubbing her little feet together knowing how awesome revenge can be when served cold.
No comments:
Post a Comment