spider fight

"I'm going to fight it.  But I'll let it live."

-Steve Zissou

two rounds into trying to capture a big spider in the bathroom.  val saw it last night and swears it gets bigger in the moonlight.  right now it is about five inches across, but fierce and fast.  its been a lot of ducking and jiving so far but the proverbial gloves are about to come off.  

i killed a relative of this spider last week.  the vengeful cousin locked in the bathroom looks very much like the spider pictured above.  the blood and guts of killing the last one coupled with my 'live and let live' mentality (an espoused theory if you will) deem the removal of the were-spider presently in question be done non-violently if possible.  

my method:  trap the spider in an empty yogurt container then transport it outside.

my arsenal:  said yogurt container.  a brochure for a botanical garden (for to slide behind and seal the yogurt container upon capture).  a six-inch sickle blade.  

recap of the match:

round 1: locate the target inside the cabinet under the sink.  i tap about with my sickle blade.  the spider scuttles out into the open, on the wall.  i go in for my first trap, taking it real slow and easy.  as i'm about to close the gap, she sidesteps, only about an inch but faster than anything i've ever seen.  i hop up and out of the bathroom with a delicate shriek.  it only takes that little move to get my blood up into full heebie-jeebie mode.  i go back in and she's still reclining on the wall.  i go in for a much faster trap.  she scuttles away easily.  i reperform my hop-shriek but with a kind of laughing curse this time.  i try another trap and another, but both times she scoots this way or that and then finally returns to the cabinet.  adrenalin pumping, i decide to take a break.

round 2: she's tucked up in the back corner of the cabinet.  i can tell she's wiser now.  the cabinet is her turf.  so many nooks and crannies.  the crannies especially.  i manage to chase her to the outside wall of the cabinet, but can't get the line to trap her.  she retreats to the thin nook between the sink and the wall.  with my sickle, i get her to move, but she's not coming out into the open anymore, and she becomes increasingly less skittish about my sickle.  on my hands and knees, and constantly checking my hat and behind me to make sure i don't get ambushed, i try to drive her from the cabinet.  i have no idea of her exact location right now but still feel pretty good about round two.  i kept my composure.  i need a change of strategy.

...

round 3:  i hit her.  lightly just enough to knock her down.  i don't know if she's hurt.  val said this one had super-spider strength so i don't count on her being injured.  i finally found her again. but she was up in the corner.  right where i can't get the cup to cover.  so i brushed her off with the sickle and she fell down in amongst the things in the bottom of the cabinet.  my heart is racing.  i'm pretty sure she's freaked out too.

[the clouds are racing outside.  emotions run high]

round 4:  there she was, up in the left corner.  my first move got her out of the cabinet and behind the sink.  i trolled through with my sickle.  at this point, madame spider completely lost her cool.  she starts scurrying madly all over the place.  down into the cabinet and across it then up and out and onto the wall underneath the shelves that fit into the corner of the room.  this flurry of activity leaves me dazed and weak-legged but in a desperate attempt to finish the fight right then and there i go in for an improbable three-corner trap.  almost as if she had resigned her soul to the fates she doesn't move as the cup goes over her and i slide her securely over the flat plane of the wall.  

we are in a somewhat awkward position at the point of capture, me bending sideways and down over the sink.  i slide the cup over to the other side of the sink, half thinking that she had gotten by me somehow and was about to spring her vengeance at any second.  i slide the brochure between the wall and the cup taking the utmost care not to give her any chance to slip out.  clamping my hand over the top, i carry spider and cup outside with the care of a laboratory scientist.  when we are safely out in the wild, i set the cup down, remove the brochure, expecting her to spring at me with bared fangs.  but she just sits there benevolently in her white plastic cell.  she waits patiently while i run inside and get my camera, smiles and then scoots off to find a new home in the flower bed.