The End Of The Spider War

Two months ago I picked up a hitchhiker.

While I was digging in northwest Illinois, a large spider had decided to go shopping for a new place to live, and apparently my car's license plate frame was big-ticket real estate that weekend. I saw the spider one day while opening my car's trunk and thought nothing of it; knowing full well that the spider will quickly realize it had chosen the wrong spot when its spot starts, well, moving into other time zones at speeds close to 90 miles an hour.

But I was wrong.

Three days ago, having forgotten about the spider altogether, I notice that it is not only still living on my license plate - it has built a very nice web. A little abode that survived for three thousand miles of driving. I can't believe this is true - so shrugging my Buddhist tendencies aside, I destroy the web and head inside my house.

But only this morning I come out of the house to discover that the spider has created an entirely new web, just like the one that was there before. This web I destroyed again, and then drove to Madison as fast as I could, hoping the spider would fly off while trying to make a new web. (I still hadn't actually seen the spider - I only knew it was living inside my trunk 's door handle mechanism.) And when I get home, I see the spider spinning its web again! "What the hell!" I think to myself. Why does this spider keep building a web here? And then it dawns on me. This spider is about three times the size it was when I saw it two months ago. I mean its massive. It must actually be getting well fed here, else it wouldn't be so taken on this spot. I don't know how that could be, but the thing sure looked fat.

I was just then considering letting it live and stay on my plate permanently. But common sense took over, knowing it could possibly get inside the car and kill me (I think it was a Wolf Spider), so I flung it off of the car and onto the road. Which is the exact moment my little brother (who is scared to death of spiders, the wimp) saw it and smashed it with his shoe.

Kind of made me sad, actually.