Two-legged freaks
“What’re you doing here so early?” I asked my co-worker. It was 6:30, my normal time to get to work, roughly 45 minutes before everyone else.
“I couldn’t sleep,” he said. “Figured I might as well come on in.”
He unlocked the back door and we both entered. The back door opens into our conference room, and my co-worker’s office is right off that. He went into his office and I paused at his door while he finished telling me about his weekend.
“And I told them I didn’t want any tech support from a third world country,” he said. “I paid too damn much money for—”
Something on the wall caught my eye.
“Holy shit, did you see the spider out here? It’s the size of Texas!” I said.
The spider wasn’t quite as big as Texas, I’ll admit, but almost. It was a common brown grass spider, the really fast darty kind that you find in the yard. Completely harmless.
“Kill it!” my co-worker squealed.
“I’m not going to kill it. I’m going to put it out back.”
“It might bite you!”
My co-worker was bitten near his eye by a brown recluse about thirteen years ago when he was 40, and had to have a piece of his ass surgically transplanted to his face to replace the necrotic skin he lost. I cut him a little slack when it comes to his fear of spiders.
“It’s not going to bite me,” I said. “It’s harmless.”
“It looks like a brown recluse!”
“It’s not a brown recluse. It’s way too big.”
I set my lunch bag down and walked over to where the spider clung to the wall. My co-worker remained in his office, keeping a watchful eye on things from afar. A stack of paper plates sat on a nearby table so I grabbed a couple. My plan was simple: put a plate in front of the spider, then touch his backside with the other so he’d walk in a calm and reasonable manner onto the first, whereupon I’d take him out the back door and over to the field.
“You should kill it,” my co-worker said.
“Hush, I’m trying to concentrate.”
I reached out and got the first plate in position. With my other hand, I gingerly reached out and touched it to the wall near the other end of the spider. When I did, the spider lost his mind. All I saw was a flash of brown as he shot over the plate, across my hand, and up my arm.
There is a bit of disagreement on what happened next. My co-worker claims I screamed first, whereas I distinctly remember hearing him scream first. In any case, there was plenty of screaming. Unfortunately, mine was high-pitched and girly, while his was deep and masculine.
The spider did not scream at all, but instead ran right on off my arm. I boogied in place for a bit while my co-worker danced a jig of his own design in his office. The spider hit the ground and kept running.
Until my co-worker ran over and stomped him, the bastard.
Remember that shed I mention every time I write something? I just realized you haven’t actually SEEN it since it looked like this a few weeks ago:
It looks a little different now.
I spent almost the entire weekend just past working on it: hanging the last seven rafters, trimming the ends to be even, attaching the rafters to the beams with rafter hangers, and putting up the purlins.
Below are some pictures from yesterday afternoon (all the purlins are actually up now; it took me 10 hours to hang 8 purlins). I have to say, I understand why guys in construction are so strong now. It’s backbreaking work.
Looking at the shed makes me feel all manly and pleased with myself.
It’s cool to think that this thing might be standing when I’m long gone,
a sort of slightly off-square legacy of sorts.
I love to stand in the shed and marvel over how BIG it is, and to know
that with the exception of two screws I built it all myself — without falling
off the ladder or breaking any bones (broken skin is another story).
I made the ridge from 10-foot 2×6s, held together with liquid nails
and screws originally, and now with added 4-inch bolts every couple of feet.
By now I’m sure you’ve heard the story of the student down at the University of Florida, the one who decided his blather to John Kerry was more important than anyone else’s. He forced his way to the front of the question line, where he went on some long rambling rant and wouldn’t shut up and let Kerry answer his questions. University cops finally dragged him away from the microphone and to the back of the auditorium while he shouted, “Don’t Tase me, bro!”
They Tasered him.
If I may be permitted to get all political for a moment: I’m concerned with how often people seem to be getting Tasered these days. Handcuffed people, autistic kids in traffic, women in wheelchairs, senior citizens, and now a kid who talked too much. Remember how the police touted the safety of the Taser as a non-lethal response when police were in danger? It seems that every day I read of someone getting zapped over nothing more than a disagreement with police. And now, some kid getting Tasered for basically being an ass.
It’s a little scary, and it makes me wonder if we’re sliding towards a police state. Hell, or if we’re already there.
Anyway, the UF student has been a big story over the last week, and you’ve probably seen video of the incident on YouTube. BUT, as it turns out, there’s a second video of the situation that shows things from a completely different perspective. I recommend you watch it, even though you might find it a tad disturbing.
And finally, something from possibly the best group there ever was.
