Wherein I use the word CRAP ten times

I remember the first time I heard a story about being crapped on by a bird. I've never seen someone get crapped on, but I thought it sounded like the most horrifying, embarrassing and utterly unrecoverable misfortune that could befall a person. Perhaps I was a teenager, and perhaps that assessment is a bit dramatic, but come on. Crapped on. In public. Crap on your being for all to see. CRAP. From an animal I hate, no less.

No, I don't hate birds, but I do hate pigeons and seagulls, the disease-riddled birds most likely to use humanity as their toilet. Jordan once told me his aunt got crapped on at the pier and I was filled with sympathy and horror. He just thought it was hilarious, which is why I won't be telling him the following story.

On Tuesday I had a FABULOUS lunch at Galanga with Naseem and Brier. The Panang curry and spicy mint noodles had never been better. We even convinced a couple of people walking by our window table to make Galanga their lunch spot, because we were that much in love with our food. I kept doing the happy dance. Good food can turn my entire day around.

As we walked back up State Street, satisfied and enjoying the sunny weather, I saw it coming. Saw it in slow motion, but was utterly unable to avoid the inevitable. Up from the sidewalk flies the filthy thing, beady eyes looking for the whitest shirt on the block. At first it was flying about head level, and I thought, "My gosh. That bird's going to run into my head." But then he pulled up and there, barely perceptible beneath his ascent, a small green missile, aimed unmistakably at the blank palette of my shirt. Powerless to move, I could only squeak my surprise and horror.

Always the gentleman (and after a hearty laugh at my expense), Brier dashed into the nearby pretzel shop and had to give a blow-by-blow description before the clerk would give him a napkin. If you've never been crapped on by a bird, perhaps you don't know that said crap does not come off with a napkin. Or with water. Or with water and hand soap from the office bathroom. I have my fingers tightly crossed that Shout! stain remover lives up to its names and shouts out my pain. That was my favorite white shirt and that bird knew it.

So the big question is: Was it as awful as I had always imagined, this crap attack? Did I almost die of shame in the street? Did my friends refuse to walk the rest of the way with me? Actually, the worst part was that this was the one time Brier didn't have his camera with him to document the scene. Because I have to admit...seeing someone get crapped on is pretty funny. Even me.

Going Crazy

Lately, in all my dreams, Jordan and I aren't married yet. He's still my boyfriend and we don't even live together. I think it must be because he's gone eight weeks out of every ten. (Gee, ya think?!)

Also due to his lengthy absences, I have suffered a new fit of spider-hating, as I am now responsible for more spider husbandry. This means other kinds of dreams. Bad dreams.

One night I dreamed that I woke up and found that the stripey spider, Shere Khan, had grown to about 15 inches, and had a fat, fat abdomen, maybe the size of a nerf football. He was essentially taking up all the space in his enclosure. Well this was terrifying to say the least. And then? Then? Then all the other spiders were freaking out because they sensed the presence of this megaspider. They were climbing the walls and trying to get out of any small hole or crack in their enclosures.

So I call Jordan (my boyfriend) to ask him to come do something about it. And he tells me he can't because he's out of state. (Duh.) And I ask him can't he keep the spiders at his apartment from now on? And he tells me he can't. He's between apartments right now. And its all very frustrating and scary and unpleasant and I wake up feeling relatively uneasy.

By that evening, of course, all this angst has melted away and I'm enjoying my nightly routine with the dog and the dinner and the dishes. Then remembering my dream I think maybe I should check on the spiders, I haven't been paying them much attention. And what do I find? WHAT DO I FIND? I find Archimedes (our future giant) trying desperately to shove himself through the mesh screen of one of his air holes. Impossible, of course, but I don't believe spiders have tremendous problem-solving skills. Still, the image really bothers me, one of the spiders actually trying to escape.

The next morning, I check on him (just to make sure he hasn't fit his enormous body through that small hole) and find that he CHEWED HIS WAY THROUGH the mesh screen. METAL mesh. CHEWED THROUGH. Am I making myself clear? Spider used fangs to destroy metal. Holy shit. I mean, he must have REALLY wanted to get out. Fortunately, as I mentioned, his body is way to big to fit through the hole. BUT STILL!!

And of course that night on the phone Jordan tells me to keep an eye on him because, you know, you never know what a creature like that is capable of. Maybe his abdomen is more flexible than we think. THANKS JORDAN! I won't go into the rest of the dreams I had that week. Because I want at least a couple of you to continue to visit me. Please. Don't leave me alone with these things.

Skunk Surprise

Holy crap. This right here is the real reason for having a blog. Couple this with my spider stories and you have an idea of the true freak show that is my life.

Brutus and I had a great weekend: Long walks, games of kong, beanbag/movie night...what more could a dog and his human companion want out of life? Apparently HE felt that a little excitement was lacking.

Sunday night at 9 pm, Brutus casually strolls to the back door. I am always at my dog's beck and call, so I jump up to let him into the back yard for a while. At 9:15 pm, I hear a sound I've never heard before. Similar to a small dog bark, but somehow I couldn't place it. "Dear God," I thought, "the neighbor's Chihuahua got into the backyard and Brutus is killing it!"

I ran to the backyard and called Brutus' name sharply. No response. I called him again and saw definite rustling near the fig tree. I ran to the vicinity, mostly afraid of what I was about to find and saw some foreign lump of fur lying near the base of the tree. I didn't have a flashlight with me and it's dark back there behind the garage, so I didn't realize what exactly was going on until Brutus began to rub his face in the grass over and over. And then I knew the awful truth: Brutus had killed a skunk.

It's amazing how long it takes for that smell to really take effect. I went back into the house, got my flashlight, and came back to confirm that the little bugger was dead. I suppose because we were outdoors, the smell still hadn't hit me. Brutus headed back to the skunk, and I yelled at him to get in the house. Get in the house? A dog who has been sprayed with liquid death? Yes, that's what I said, fool that I am. When I got to the living room, he was already back in his beanbag, looking truly mortified for not only screwing himself, but making all social gatherings at our home an impossibility for the next two to four weeks. When I grabbed the bath basket and called him to the bathroom, he didn't even hesitate to jump into the tub.

Now, maybe you're familiar with the resultant odor of a skunk spray...perhaps you've smelled it in your neighborhood, or in your car as you drove past roadkill skunk. But let me tell you, until you've experienced it in its purest form, you have no idea what a sinister creature the skunk really is. It's like having onion juice injected directly into your tear ducts and sinuses, at least that's the best description I could come up with at that particular moment. It was not stinky, it was poisonous. I still have pain in the space behind my face from the noxious fumes. We washed with both toothpaste (an internet recommendation) and his doggie shampoo, and as far as I can tell the results were decent. But truly, after being hit with that stink bomb, my nose didn't really make much of a judge.

So today he's locked in the backyard rather than hanging out and infecting my office. Hopefully my sense of smell will have recovered by 5 pm so that I can go home and discover just how ruined he really is. And if the gods be benevolent, the neighborhood skunks have learned not to enter the Clark Family Death Zone. Because love him though I may, that dog ain't the sharpest tool in the shed.

The Tragic Tale of the TaranTula Triplex (and more)

For those of my readers (all 3 of you) who already know this story (all 3 of you) I apologize for writing it again. You see, it must be part of my written documentation so that when I die they can use it in my bid for sainthood.

It was more than a year and a half ago that Jordan and I found our new house. The perfect house for us. Two bedrooms, decent backyard, and a detached garage (aka the laBORatory). We had no pets at the time. Unusual for a couple who had owned a ball python, a rosy boa named "azul", a large and very cranky iguana, a musky sugar glider, and no less than three water turtles. As we were packing for the move, Jordan ran across an old terrarium and asked if I thought he should toss it. "No way. What if you want another snake or something? And you know you will."

Well this triggered something in his tireless brain. "Hey, can I get a tarantuala?" Now, I hate tarantulas. I can deal with house spiders, daddy long-legs in the shower, stuff like that. But I've always disliked the idea of these weighty, hairy, big-fanged creatures. So I just said no, no way was one of these things living in my house. "But wait!" says the boy-genius, "I can keep it in the garage! Brilliant!" I had to admit he had me there. So I acquiesced and we went to the pet store and picked out a rather common Chilean Rose Hair. Jordan named her (him?) Parker Posey.

Not long after Parker had settled in, we began to experience an uncommonly cold winter for Santa Barbara. Even with a heat lamp, the terrarium just wasn't warm enough for a desert dwelling spider. At least that's what he told me, and so I agreed to let him keep him in the guest bedroom for a while. But I could think of no guest who would want to sleep with a spider, so I made him promise to come up with a solution quick. It was his off season at work, so he had plenty of time.

It seems like it was just days after this episode that I came home from work to find Jordan at the computer. "Hey, I just ordered the coolest spiderling. It's only a quarter inch long. It'll be here in a few days!"

Blink. Blink blink. "You ordered another spider? When your wife has made it abundantly clear that she hates them?!"

"But..." blink blink..."you like spiders now."

The story only got worse when I found out this was to be a Salmon Pink Bird Eater that would grow to 10 inches at full maturity. A 10 inch spider. In my home. And of course a quarter inch spiderling would DEFINITELY have to stay indoors. God dammit. His name is Archimedes.

Well, I'm a tough cookie and so I put my foot down. At five. Yes, that's right. Five tarantulas. "We" have added a Costa Rican Tigerrump (Shere Khan), Indian Ornamental (Pi), and some species of Baboon (Atlas).

And this is where they live.

We call it the condo. An impressive piece of handmade furniture that makes our friends and relatives only marginally more comfortable spending time in our home. Every time Jordan's away for a long period of time at work, I'm pretty sure I'm going to kill one, but I've had no success yet. They're tenacious little suckers.

So the next time your loved one makes you feel a little bonkers with their demands, remember the sad tale of Santa Marianna and tell yourself..."Hey. It's not five spiders."

the kitten who beat up my dog