Spider

Today I saw my first Huntsman spider actually inside the building where we live.

I've seen one in the garage underneath, and you kind of expect it there but the first time you see one inside is a bit of a shock because it looks so out of place and huge and tarantula-like against the paint on the wall.

Darren had already seen it but hoped I wasn't going to notice as we were walking down the stairwell outside our front door. But then I spotted it and did a little hopping dance and went back up the stairs making all sorts of girly whimpering noises.

"You've got to come downstairs" he said

"I can't" I replied. "You've got to get rid of it"

"I can't reach it" he protested.

I ought to have known there was no way Darren was going near this fella, not even wearing his chopperdoc get-up and the bush-fire goggles. The Huntsman spider is so huge you can actually tell which way his eyes are looking (in fact he's so bloody enormous he can probably nod and shake his head for yes and no). He also has special joints which allow him to scuttle sideways instead of just forwards, so he can get you wherever you're standing as well.

I did eventually come down the stairs, I mean, there was no other way out aside from hurling myself off the balcony, and by a stroke of luck I found the maintenance man pruning bushes in the driveway.

"Do you think it's his job to get rid of big spiders as well?" I asked

"I think if you go down there making that noise and that face, he'll sort it out"

So I went marching off up the driveway and told the nice man what I'd seen. He reassured me it wasn't dangerous but did concede that it was "fecking huge" so put his pruning shears down and went off to sort it out.

When we got home this evening it was gone, but the credit card rule remains in force.

nb. The credit card rule, n, the unspoken (and sometimes spoken) vow that if we ever see a huntsman spider inside the flat and Darren's not here to deal with it, Ella and I take a weekend case and a credit card and book ourselves into the Airport Stamford Plaza; the one with an ensuite jacuzzi.