As Taylor and I were completing a quick run around the block a couple of days ago, she was taken aback when suddenly I grabbed her, swung her behind me and took on a frozen, protective stance.
This is what I saw:
Ok well, not EXACTLY what I saw but pretty close.
No lie, a full-sized, full-on TARANTULA-- just walking down the sidewalk in the neighborhood.
I gasped. Taylor screamed.
Still frozen in a combination of fear and disbelief, my mind immediately identified it, but then dismissed the idea because I could not bring myelf to believe tarantulas wander our yards. I was too scared to try to kill it myself, so, with Taylor flying off my arm behind me, I ran to the neighbor's house whose yard it was in and rang the doorbell. No answer. Ran across the street. No answer. I don't know what I was looking for but probably one of the macho dads to come out and kill it so I didn't have to.
Letting it roam the neighborhood did not seem to be an option. I conceeded I would have to take matters into my own hands and ran back to the site of the initial spotting only to find two ladies with strollers stopped and watching the spectacle with a face of disbelief identical to mine. Then the brave one nonchalantly walked over, picked up a big rock, and dropped it on the specimen. Dead.
The three of us talked about it and convinced ourselves it was some child's escaped pet.
Later that night when my other neighbor informed me her husband had found one dead in her yard the day before, the comforting thought of an escaped pet vanished. Two escaped pets? Unlikely. Tarantula invasion? Now much, much more likely.
Yikes! My kids are now instructed to keep the garage and front door closed and inspect all shoes before putting them on.
Jake has been instructed to spray the yard. I can't help but think though it's not going to have any affect on a tarantula. If you have ever seen one in real-life, they are less spider and more some strange form of monster-mammal that would be better stopped by some sort of fencing than any spray.
The next day I went back and took a picture of the thing, now shriveled and dead and thus much less scary looking but try to imagine it crawling down the sidewalk toward you, about the size of your hand:
