Banana Spiders and Other Strange Creatures

I haven't had the internet at home for about a week! I wrote this entry many days ago, but saved it as a draft instead of posting. It probably doesn't matter since I doubt anybody is reading this anyway.

At home, in my civilian life, there is VERY little chance I’m killing a bug that enters my house. That job is left to my husband. My reaction is to scream, run out of the room, and call for my husband. At school, though, I am not so lucky. I’m the person in charge, so I have to take care of the situation. I wish I could say that I let the bug crawl on a piece of paper and carry it outside, thereby preserving its life, but I don’t. Any bug in my classroom is toast. I’ve killed countless bugs over the years. Last year alone I probably killed over a dozen bees. My method, although not very humane, is to spray them with Fantastic. Most bugs just get squashed.

This morning, during our reading lesson, I noticed one of my students was not paying attention. Instead, she was looking on the floor next to her and about ready to jump out of her seat. As I was about to address this, she raised her hand and told me, “Ms. M, there’s a banana spider on the floor.” My response: “A what spider???” I walked over and there’s this creepy, HUGE, gross spider on the floor. Now I didn’t know if this spider was a “banana spider,” (sounds made up to me), but I did know that I had to be the calm one and actually go near the spider. On the outside I looked very confident, like this was nothing to worry about, but on the inside I was crying “Oh my god!”

I quickly stomped it with my foot and the incident, thankfully, was over…until one of my kids picked it up by one of its mangled legs while I was getting a tissue. This TOTALLY grossed everybody, including me, out, and ended up being a bigger deal than the so-called banana spider being there in the first place. Why anybody would want to pick up a dead spider is beyond me. Kids are strange.