Ribby Shell Love and Message From Ms. Muffet: Send Lithium

Love.

And that was going to be the end of the post.  All calm and wordless, like a poem of Denim Silk Ribby Shell pictures. But could my life leave well enough alone?  Noooooooooooo. Do I have a cute and sweet story about bluebird fledglings?  Noooooooo.  But it's a nature story. 

I.am.freaking.out. Every follicle, every cell, every strand of my hair is crawling and itching. I can't sit still and I'm batting at little baby cobwebs in the air. 

A nest of spiders has hatched in my home office. It happened exactly this way last year. I don't remember if I blogged about it or not, but I certainly do remember the incident. It lasted over a period of several days, from when the spiders first hatched and were invisible to the naked eye, but my skin could feel the little bastards biting me and crawling on me and landing on me, but I could not see anything, so I naturally assumed I was losing my frickin' mind, to when the next day they got a little bit bigger and I thought perhaps I could see something, to the third day when it was make-no-mistake, this is an endless stream of 64 million little spiders falling from the ceiling directly onto me and my laptop and my printer, definitely heading for me purposefully.  They were little paratroopers looking for blood, and they were making me CRAZY. Once I could see them, I could at least stand armed with the vacuum cleaner and vacuum them up as they came down, and if I could see them in their microscopicness crawling on the ceiling, I could vacuum them up there before they rained down upon me.

This year I am onto them, so it only took me about an hour of being bitten and crawled on and cobweb-mummified before I figured out what the hell was going on.  This is the exact moment that my prized posh expensive printer decided to go berserk (I suppose one of the little fuckers got inside the fan or chewed a computer wire or something) which caused me to in turn go berserkier.

For example, the page on the left (now printed correctly) printed as what you see on the right. 

A bunch of freaky numbers and symbols. (You do see freaky numbers and symbols, right?  Or am I just having a psychotic episode?)  And the printer kept shutting off and back on and doing "self test," and obviously flunking the self-test and shutting itself off again. With about 1,400 pages to print in the next couple of days, hyperventilation was definitely in order.   

But first the scritchy-scratchy-dance and the vacuuming of the ceiling.  And the walls.  And the curtain rods.  And the lamp over my desk.  And behind the desk. And the fan in the printer.  And the other computer. And every inch of the floor. And the air.  And the air conditioner and the curtains.  And next I was ready to take down the sheetrock and vacuum behind it and knock down the wall of the house.  And then shave my head and vacuum up the shavings and burn my clothes. After that, I wanted to take the vacuum cleaner and put cement shoes on it and drop it in the ocean.  Not the Atlantic, not the Pacific -- the Indian.  The Atlantic and the Pacific are too close and the little spiders would be able to crawl back home and find me.

A few months ago, I did the deposition of a charming woman who hails from Newfoundland, but now lives here and practices psychiatry at our largeish hospital down the road. Aside from the fact that she spoke at 650 words a minute in a heavy Newfoundlander accent and I had a splitting headache the day I did her deposition, I loved her. She was the first "normal" psychiatrist-person I've ever met. At least I think so. 

But during a break she was telling us a story (that she held up her hand and swore was "the God's-honest truth and not an urban myth") about a woman she once had in da hospital, dere, who was severely psychotic, eh? The woman barred the door and would not let the hospital people in the room. They would have to break down her barriers in order to get in when she was asleep.  The woman kept saying that spiders were crawling all.over.her.room. The doctors kept saying, "Increase her lithium.  She's completely batshit."  (psychiatrists and pathologists, I have found, have absolutely no compunction about using non-p.c. terms)

Then one day an orderly got through the lady's room barrier and was standing at the end of the bed, tending to her. He looked up on the wall behind her bed and saw the biggest nest of spiders he had ever seen in his life, all crawling down the wall.

Send lithium.  I'm completely batshit. 

And now I'm even farther behind in my work than I was before.  And this morning I have to torture my poor little Vincent by denying him breakfast. Good thing he's fairly feeble right now. Otherwise, he'd probably eat my leg on the way to the ultrasound. Excuse me, I have to get back to vacuuming my air.
 

Comments

[Ruth]

aaaaaaaaah! Spiders!

ick, ick, ick, ick, ICK.

[Mary-Heather]

You should move.

Seriously. I had to read most of this entry while squinting because I just couldn't take it. This has happened two years in a row? OMG...

FLEE!

But take that denim silk with you, it's beautful.

[Rabbitch]

Spiders are our friends.

Fortunately I am a rock and need no friends. Therefore I kill them at will.

I live in the woods and so am inundated with spiders. A lot. But yeah, in gangs they freak me out some. I understand completely.

[molly!]

That sounds horrible. I think I would have had a stroke or something if I were you. I am very impressed that you haven't moved. At least the worst over, right? Hang in there!

[Isela]

eeek, run...pack the yarn and needles and flee as fast as you can.

[Emma.]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH !

Stand in shower for very long time. Drink medicinal brandy. No way I'm visiting you at this time of year. ;-]

[Kathleen]

Is that stash yarn--you good girl? Too bad you are so freaking holisitic...there must be some sorta fumigation that could be done.

[Laurie]

OH god. That story is hilarious. And your spiders are a plague. I'd abandon ship, wait til they were visible, and .... and .... no, you can't fog the damn room with bug spray. Vacuum. Yeah. You got it right.

[Bonney]

Fingers crossed for Vincent!

[Cara]

I got no problems with spiders, but I have serious SERIOUS issues with bugs you can't see crawling all over you. I wouldn't go back to Florida for like ten years after a particularly heinous incident with no-see-ums.

DUDE. I would've had to check myself in somewhere.

[ann]

guano Norma. The PC term is "Norma is completely guano".

[liz]

Make sure you don't have any cardboard boxes in your office and put the paper in a filing cabinet or something because they love paper and especially cardboard.

Someone once told me that spiders hate Lemon Pledge, and I will say that we had them all over the place for a while and I just sort of generally sprayed some Lemon Pledge around and it seemed to help.

We also bought one of those bug "sound barrier" things and although I was pretty sceptical, it seemed to help. I'm not saying we were bug-free, but we seemed to have fewer mosquitos and spiders in the house. Now that I think about it, I should get another one!

[Lucia]

If it were *one* spider I would tell you about how I have never been afraid of spiders because my dad told me when I was little about all the good things they do, a lesson later reinforced by practically memorizing Charlotte's Web. Innumerable spiders crawling on you? Ewwwwwwww.

[margene]

I'm going to be jumpy and itchy all day!!!!

[Vicki]

Okay, so you know I had my spider incident already and got rid of that big mama and her next ASAP -- okay, I didn't do it, DH did. I have had that spider hatching, babies flying experience (sans the biting part), though, and it can drive you batty.

Obviously, it will. ; )

Ooooh, that lady gone batshit over the spiders story is a GOOD one -- gave me shivers!

[Vicki]

Make that nest. I hope there won't be a next nest.

[pippi]

what a crazy story, (bout the batshit lady) i'm glad someone finally believed her! ayeyayaey!
but, i hope you saved nellie, arania and joy; at least...

give the printer a good whack.
luck to sweet vincient today!

[S.Kate]

I'd like to book my tickets now for next year's performance of "Norma and the Dance of the Spider Babies."

[Roxie]

Best of luck to Vincent and to you. When I had spiders hatching, I used up a can of my roommate's hairspray on them. Just lacquered the little bastards into place. Decades later, DH and I rented a car that had a hatching of preying mantises under the dashboard. We were driving along, and his hunter's eye spotted movement. Teensy, weensy, almost white little bugs dancing along the dash. During the course of the day, as we drove, they grew, darkened, and ate each other. Every time we stopped, we evicted more of them. By day's end, there were about fifteen bright green, inch-long perfect little predators to release into the motel's aphid-infested bushes. I'm not bothered by bugs as long as I can see them coming, but the invisible attacks - eeeeeewwwwww! Creepy!!

[claudia]

I won't tell the husband about this. Spiders..um...aren't his thing.

[may]

The exact same thing happened to me last night. Tiny spiders all over the ceiling RIGHT ABOVE MY BED. I vacuummed best I could but decided to sleep on the sofa. Argh! I do hope it doesn't get any worse. Good luck to you too!

[Martha]

Don't you hate it when you tell your doctor there are spiders crawling all over you and he doesn't listen?
I know I do.

[Chris in MN]

You've totally given me the creepy crawlies. And I have poison ivy that I can't scratch. Thanks a bunch, Norma. ugh.

[--Deb]

Ack!

[--Deb]

(Huh. I love the irony that it took more typing to confirm that I wanted in fact to leave you a comment than it took to type the actual comment. So, naturally, I had to come back and tell you that!)

[Carole]

Oh, gross. And now I feel all creepy and itchy. Thanks a lot, Norma.
Hugs to Vincent. Hope you get some good news today.

[jessica~]

Spiders don't usually bother me but when they are little like that and EVERYWEHRE if kind of freaks me out. Usually I toss them outside but if they come down from the ceiling, over my head - they die.

Let's not even get into SPIDERSINTHEHAIR okay? *shudder*

[Melanie]

I used to be terrified of spiders but now I'm fine with them. I *do* hate that instant creepy-crawly brain-induced itchiness when you've found an unexpected arachnid/insect and then you're convinced that there are bugs on you...somewhere.

I figure the spiders eat the mosquitoes and since we've currently cornered the market on the damn things here in southern NH, I'm happy to see our 8-legged friends and their healthy appetites in the corners of my ceilings.

[Beth S.]

You just described my very worst nightmare. Except that in mine, the spiders are bigger, and possibly hairier.

*shudder*

[rho1640]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who goes thru this yearly -- it has been 2 years for us too. ugh!!

[Cookie]

Once upon a time, my mother worked for a day care center. One of the teachers brought in an egg sack, so the kids could watch spiders be born/hatched/something. There were tiny little spidies all over everything and everyone. Black widow baby spidies. Mixed blessing... my mother was the only one bitten by one of them. o.0

See... could be worse at your house.

*hugs Norma & Vincent*

[Stalker Angie]

I despise spiders. They are the only thing that make me feel all girly and weak and your story creeped me out to the point that I will forever and always skip this post. Forever. Amen.

Oh and I think I threw up a little in my mouth. One word, Norma Dear. Disclaimer. Just, warn a girl, ok?

[Steph B.]

Eeeuwwwww! I hate spiders. I normally stand and point and just keep repeating "Spider," until someone comes and kills it. I completely become a child. Very odd, because I'll stay up until the cockroach comes out again so I can kill it DEAD rather than not know where it is and they're so much bigger and ickier...

Re the computer: You know they only break down when you have a lot of pages to get out or an expedite. It's part of their evil charm. I swear mine is telepathic.

[Elisabeth]

I had to take an ativan after just _reading_ your post. I don't know what I would've done if I had _been_ there! If I were you, I'd move. Far away. The house is a loss, just buy the hermitage now and forget about it.

Oh, do you grow hedge apples (http://hedgeapple.com/)? They're green bumpy things that have kind of a mothbally scent. Put them in the corners of your basement to keep bugs out. Put them in the corners of your office if you like. I usually buy them in the fall when I can. I'm not sure if they are available earlier in the year.

[jillian]

I don't usually mind spiders so much...but that would freak me OUT! Lithium indeed.

[Steph VW]

Shall we add your spiders to my list of "Things that must die"?

I love the line "Norma needs a yes or no" in the transcript. Heh heh.

Ah, Newfies, they have a colourful way of gettin' roight to da point, don't dey?

[Starry]

Giving away my prairie roots here...I once vaccuumed up a crap-load of wee tiny grasshoppers that were hanging out along the track of the patio door. My parents totally did not believe me until the next batch hatched. (Don't ask me how eggs got laid in the inside track of the patio door. It was a bad year for grasshoppers.)

A grasshopper ranks right up there with spiders for the heebie jeebies if they ever land on you. Grasshoppers cling. Blech.

And the vaccuum is often my weapon of choice when it comes to bug removal. You should hear the sound a big moth makes when it's sucked off a stipple ceiling. Phhh-thwump!!

[Katherine]

Oh, good luck with the ultrasound. I hope Vincent just gets better and better.

In a garden center where I used to work, we sold Praying Mantis eggs. You're supposed to store them in the refrigerator so they won't hatch until you actually want them to. But we would take one or two out each day so people could see them and buy them. We rotated them in and out of the fridge.

One night an egg got left out. It hatched. Not that you could tell (at all) that it had hatched. More like over the next few days, we started seeing these tiny little thread creatures. They got bigger. And ate each other (sad). And suddenly started looking like tiny praying mantises.

My job description changed for a few days to "catch as many baby praying mantises as possible and release them outside on the spruce, where there's food aplenty, believe you me."

I realize that there is little horror in the presence of baby mantids as compared to baby spiders. Good luck with yours, and maybe sometimes you could try IMAGINING that they are something as lovable as tiny praying mantises.

[Lisa]

The same thing happened at my home when a spider's nest hatched in our Christmas tree. I looked up at the ceiling and saw thousands of little crawly things. I then proceeded to scream at my then 4 year old, telling her to get out of the room while I went for the vacumn cleaner. Oh, and you never saw anyone get a Christmas tree out of house faster.

[sandy]

Spiders may indeed be our friends, but they are not invited to co habitate. Ever. Ever.
Ever.
Love the ribby shell.
Ever.

[Celia]

Norma, it looks like you could use this:
http://pestcontrol.netfirms.com/page24.html

Our spider-phobic girlie has one. Check it out. Sucks 'em up and kills them dead. The end.

[Kristen]

Oh. My. God. I'm not going to sleep tonight! I used to be a serious arachnophobe. I no longer have frequent "spidermares." (My family will tell you about the time I had a spidermare and was out in the hallway screaming before I even woke up. I was 24.) I may tonight. AYIEEE!!!

[AnnP]

This seems to be an expecially buggy summer. Ticks and chiggers have suddenly taken over my own backyard. Spiders in every corner of the house. I must admit I like to watch the baby spiders when they hatch *outside* and go sailing off on their lifelines.
Funny though, not many fireflies.

[Kae]

Dude. The only thing I hate more than spiders happens to be snakes. I'm going to have nightmares tonight.

[Mary]

You gave me such the heebie jeebies i'm itching all over!!!!

But maybe I'm just going batshit too.

[Sue]

It's like an Alfred Hitchcock movie!

[Jennifer]

Thanks I needed that - a good laugh, after doing battle with a mighty financial corporation, directly hit the spot. Maybe I can pop one less generic acid reducer to get through this day. Love to Vincent. Liberty and Duke will keep postive thoughts for him.

[Juls]

Ick!! We had the same craziness...but luckily they were crawling up from the floor vent. They were just everywhere. I going nuts trying to zap them all.

[laura]

I read this the other day and just thought, "Ewwwwww, that is so gross!". As far as I could recall, that's never happened in my house...

Tonight: Had to vacuum tons of little spiders off my kitchen ceiling. So. Gross. Ack!

[Wendy]

I have had some spider weirdness myself. Yesterday I am using the bathroom and when I went to grab the toilet paper I noticed a spider hanging from the heel of my sock. In the compromising position that I was in I took the toilet paper and grabbed it and squished it. Later, realized it wasn't dead. It was a baby black widow spiders. We have had a bad case of them here lately, but this is the first one I saw in the house.

Your microscopic spiders sound way scarier, though. I would be calling pest control.