Good:
There are hidden blessings to having no idea about US geography – I get some wonderful surprises. (Before you read this next sentence and are stunned stupid at the depth of my ignorance, remember that they teach Canadians about as much US geography as they teach Americans about Canadian geography.) In the absence of a dead giveaway (like “Long Beach” which sort of has a tip off in it) I was absolutely delighted to arrive in Madison
Connecticut and discover that I was at the sea! (Technically, Long Island Sound, but it sure looked like the ocean to me.)
The sock and I hung out for a bit, it was a scorcher of a day and I waded happily in the ocean for a little, communing with the birds and admiring the seashells they leave on the boardwalks and piers. It’s a lovely spot, West Wharf Beach. I tried to Kinnear myself with the self-timer on the camera.
But it turns out it’s sort of hard to secretly take pictures of yourself.
Bad:
I don’t shower. I may have mentioned this before… my home growing up had just a bathtub, and our home now is similarly showerless, and I may have been somewhat formed by a viewing of the shower murder scene in Psycho at a vulnerable age. A combination of that cinematic trauma and my lack of exposure to this method of human cleansing has resulted in a collosal discomfort with showering in general. I bathe. You can read, no water falls on your head, you can hear any knife wielding murderer coming in….you know if your kids have started a fire or the phone is ringing. Baths are better….so imagine my regret when my hotel room just had this:
Sadly, I had got to the beach and gotten myself somewhat grubby before I had internalize the lack of a bath, so I couldn’t just opt out.
I briefly considered just washing the serious bits with a washcloth, but decided that personal growth is an admirable goal and that I should just put on my big girl pants and suck it up. Showering. Millions of people do it. I can too. I double locked the door, checked the closet and under the bed and i got myself in there, washing up as efficiently as I was able.
The Ugly:
Have I ever mentioned that I am sort of “cautious” about spiders? I don’t care for them. I respect their right to be here, wholeheartedly support their bug eating role in the universe and have read and enjoyed Charlotte’s web many times. I still don’t like them. I especially don’t like them close to me…. so you can imagine my horror when I spotted one of the eight legged interlopers in the shower with me.
There is no arguing with ones psyche, so to put it in simple terms, when confronted with a spider IN A SHOWER (think on the stress level of combining two fears at once) I…to put it mildly…
I lost my s**t.
I wigged out. It was between me and the shower exit. It was huge. I couldn’t see it properly because I didn’t have my glasses on (I hate that about showers) so I could not even be clear if it was advancing on me. It loomed and lurked viciously at me from the shower floor and I FLIPPED. I threw my soapy self past the shower curtain, fleeing soaking wet and very nearly hysterical as the voice in the back of my mind screamed helpful things like “YOU ARE GOING TO DIE. THIS IS WHAT COMES OF SHOWERING” and I beat it, soggy and dripping out of harms way.
After a brief period of recovery (during which I watched the shower edge vigilantly…the only thing worse than a spider in the shower is a spider SOMEWHERE in a hotel room, there was no way I was going to lose track of it) I got my glasses to improve my odds and advanced upon her with murderous intent. (I know. I’m a pacifist, but I have just got to be able to use the bathroom.) As I stealthily peered over the edge to locate the enemy, I collapsed in relief.
It was hair. To add insult to injury, it was MY hair.
I was terrorized and humiliated by my own hair and stupidity. I swear. It’s a wonder I function at all.
The Good:
Meeting knitters at RJ Julia.
More Good:
Young knitters (note the even gender split again.)
Even more good:
Kate with a Rhode Island washcloth. (It’s got a lighthouse on it.)
Karen’s 1st sock.
So Bad it’s good:
Lisa outing Mandy’s 1st socks, which are, for once…about what you would expect in a first pair of socks, (they aren’t even the same size) and restoring my faith in normal 1st sock knitters.
More so Bad it’s Good:
Kimberly was caught with the proof that she was behind the great Boston Panty Incident.
Better than Good:
When Mary had to go to the hospital, as she was loaded into the ambulance, her husband yelled ” Which knitting bad do you want?”
(She’s really a woman after my heart.)
Also better than Good
Rebecca’s shawl.
’nuff said.
The Tremendously Good:
Barbara the Hat lady with her haul
The bad:
Arriving home and having one of my molars break, (I think it’s the shower/spider/hair incident that did it in) and incurring a fantastical dental bill that will mean that there is no yarn buying for quite some time to come. (There’s a temporary thingie on it to let me go to Halifax tomorrow)
The Ugly:
Unpacking, washing my clothes and packing them again.
The Good:
Unpacking, washing my clothes and packing again FOR HALIFAX. Dudes. I am stupid excited. ( And sort of stoned on the tooth drugs. Should make for a really fun time at the event tomorrow. If I can arse up my life this much straight, heaven only knows what will come of the drugged up version.) All you East Coasters…I’ll see you tomorrow!
PS. The bad.
Friends don’t let stoned friends knit a Kauni.
I arsed it up again. Orange where there should be green. There has got to be something simple in this house I can knit for a while.
Oh goodness. Can I send you one of my tennis-racket bugzappers to help with the spiders? You’ll have to do your own Kauni reknitting, though.
AM I FIRST???
Oh goodness, by the way, as in, I was laughing so hard it was hard to type.
As the daughter of a spider-phobe (yeah, there’s a scientific name, and I do know it) and the wife of a BATHer, I feel your pain. Of course, I also nearly wet myself laughing, but…
I would laugh, but I’ve had similar experiences in the shower, only with real spiders. They terrify me too, if they get too close.
Have fun in Halifax.
Don’t worry- I’ve done the hair thing myself numerous times (it’s what comes of having a basement bathroom where all the spiders like to hang out and dark hair that likes to bunch itself up into spidery-looking clumps)
And hey! I’m an American and I know some Canadian geography! …I know where the provinces are on a map, at least…and that’s more than they ever taught me in school.
Not having fears around spiders or bugs I haven’t tried this (small dead mammals gross me out) but I have seen in catalogs a device that lets you slide a tube over the bug (from further away than the cup and card trick), capture it and then release or destroy. I think the Solutions catalog has it as well as others. Although if having said device means no more entries like this to chortle over….
Love the tale of the killer spider. Finally read Vogue last night and now I “get” what was going on…. too funny, now imagine how you can brag at the music cocktail parties!!! Oh yes, they even throw panties….
I have to disagree about Canadians not being taught American geography. I grew up in Alberta & in grade eight, we had to memorize all the states, all the capitals and be able to place them on a map! But then again, this same social studies teacher made us do push ups if we talked in class, so perhaps it was just us . . .
Oh, you poor thing. I’m so sorry about the hair-spider shower incident. It’s no wonder you cracked a tooth. I just about cracked a rib laughing, though. Have a great time in Halifax.
spiders are very scary. whenever i find one, i have to make someone else get it.
once a spider egg hatched in my bedroom and i had to make my mom come vaccuum up millions of tiny teeny spiders before i could go back in, and i still was so freaked out that i had to sleep on the couch for a couple days.
have fun in halifax!
Yeah, I hate when my hair comes crawling after me, too – really creeps me out!
(larfing my butt off)
I just missed you in CT by a week. I love that beach and would have gotten just as grimy as you did. Sorry about your shower fiasco, but it was pretty damn funny, you must know this.
It is good you have so many new pairs of big girl panties at a time like this, faced with showers and spiders and such. And since I live in a landlocked state I feel the need to tell you that once you enter the ocean, you enter the food chain. Be careful out there!
First, stoned knitting is what it is, and you pretty much have to know that it will never, ever be a good thing.
Second – I would have STILL been freaking with the hair, since I have just slightly more than a freaking aversion to hair in the water. I’d have probably taken the shower with me, if not the first time, then definately the second – outdoor shower, anyone??
My Mom used to rescue spiders she found in our house and took them gently outside. To the everlasting horror of my children, I do the same. My daughter-who is 23- refused to come in the front door as a spider had a web right next to it. Son is similarily disposed. I can tell by how thet yell “Mom!” that it’s time for me to rescue them from yet another spider. We live in a woodsy area so it happens alot.
I still haven’t decided whether it’s better to shower blind (my default) or with contacts. I, too, grew up in a bathing household–we HAD showers, they just didn’t work until I was about 17, so we bathed in the second-floor bathrooms and trudged down to the ground floor laundry room to wash our hair in, well, a wash tub. I had no trouble converting to showers, but I’m torn between being frightened by what I THINK I see when I can’t see anything, and what I really DO see when I occasionally shower with my contacts in. (Oh, and the horror extends just as much to the state of my thighs as to what may or may not be crawling out of the drain.)
You crack me up.
As for plain knitting, it’s never too early to knit mittens. I mean plain ones, not fancy-arsed Latvian Finnish Fair Isle braided stranded steeked ones.
I think it has been a great many years since they taught much US geography in US schools. I know my daughters didn’t have it & they are 34 & 31. I am convinced that the only way to really learn geography is to travel (preferably in a train or car – anything but a plane). I have had a thing about showers since I saw Psycho also. AND I read an interview with Janet Leigh (the actress in the shower scene) & she had the same reaction – she said she had not taken a shower since seeing the movie!!!
I was just talking with my boyfriend about this. I was drinking the other night, and I started and finished a kid-sized Fair Isle hat with no mistakes, which was pretty amazing.
A few days later, I had crippling back pain, and took some off-brand back & muscle pills and holy crap. I know there are plenty of illegal drugs out there, but as long as I can nip over to the drug store and get said back pills, nevermind! Of course, I couldn’t knit at all when I was high on those.
Interestingly, I can’t knit when I’m high on anything (drugs are bad, blah blah). My brain just wants to watch my hands the whole time and that works fine for a while and then the whole process gets stopped up along the way.
I jumped at a hair spider in the shower yesterday, too. Then I remembered house-spiders don’t come in orange. I hope. My heart was still all poundy for a few minutes though, which is the most ashamed sort of feeling I can think of.
You and my Mom (from the UK), and the thing about Psycho and showers- she had the fear for decades. Must have something to do with being a knitter–
Some of us are so blind that we have always bathed or showered with our glasses on …
As for the molars, after having 2 break or crack at old filling sites, I bit the bullet (no pun intended) and had the metal fillings removed and replaced with the new white fillings that apparently don’t come loose or put as much stress on the remaining tooth material. Just saying, you know, that one big honking bill and 2 days in the dental office is better than a succession of big honking bills and crowns. Besides, it’s nice to have what looks like whole teeth again, even though the dentist and I know they aren’t. I only have one remaining metal filling and it was so new that the dentist knew the insurance would not cover replacing it.
Just a tip. Those of us who shower regularly take our big girl pants OFF first.
I feel similarly about American geography and I supposedly learned it at one point… one of the many useless bits of information I never use in the real world.
And just so you feel better, if it HAD been an actual spider, you really would have showed it who was boss. 😉
Well, on the bright side, when you walloped at high speed out of the shower, you: A) did not retreat clear out into the hallway, and B) at least had your big girl pants on.
Oh. Wait. You probably meant that metaphorically. Right? ::tries the innocent look, but is doubtful that’ll work::
Can hardly wait for the Halifax report (of course we love these reports, what’s not to love?), but man, sympathies on the stoopid expensive broken molar. Ouch. Well, everyone will just have to throw yarn at you, that’s all!
Hurray for Mary’s knitting-bag-remembering husband!
I have done that mistaking-non-spidery-things-for-spiders thing before too, i think it comes from peripheral vision and/or moments of not wearing glasses.
I hope your tooth feels better and that Halifax treats you well!
I was so traumatised by Pyscho that I only take showers in the day time when other people I trust are in the house (doesn’t always work though–when lunatic family members thinks its funny to jingle the door handle on ya just to hear you scream–if I didn’t lock the door I would get cold water dumped on me). I also use clear shower curtains so I can see the maniac coming (now that I am adult I don’t close the door).
It’s a wonder I even bathe at all.
I’m with you sister! I HATE spiders and with good reason – was bitten by one once.
Yeh, put down the Kauni until you aren’t on strong tooth meds. Time to knit a simple scarf!
Enjoy Halifax! See you at Bailey’s Crossing in Sept.
Steph, I’m one of your male knitting fans, and even though I do sympathize with your Kauni problems, it offers me so much hope to know that I’m not the only one who has to rip from time to time. Thanks for the encouragement.
Gene
I judge hotels by their bathtubs, and any hotel with NO bathtubs is not to be borne! Many years ago when I was finishing my master’s degree in library science, I had to spend a summer on campus in the sublet apartment of the library school’s secretary’s son. The apartment was in front of a creek, and the first night I was in the tub, minus my glasses, of course, I saw something crawling up the shower curtain. It was the beginning of the Summer of the Giant Albino Crickets. They climbed into the apartment from the creek and we endangered our lungs by spraying around any openings we saw. Every morning one of us (I shared Bug Hell with a friend even more horrified than I was) would find Giant Albino Cricket corpses. Argh!
I think I laughed so hard about the spider because I can see myself doing the same thing! Have fun in Halifax and may it be insect attack free!
I laugh at the spider thing only because I did the same thing once. OK, more than once, but I am terrified of spiders. And then there was the time when it WASN’T a hair, but we don’t talk about that.
I always took showers when I was a kid because we’d either have water pump problems or drain field problems. Get wet – turn off water and soap up – rinse. Now, I can’t stand to sit in dirty water like you tubbers do. Oh, and being a lace-makers, spiders are good people. Except, of course, for brown recluse or black widow spiders. I live in the north so they are not a problem here.
I’m glad to hear I’m not the only one who has an unnatural fear of spiders – especially when one is blocking the exit. I once freaked out in my cube when a co-worker carried in a dead spider. I seriously considered leaping up on my desk and over the partition into the next cube. My boyfriend thinks it’s funny to scare me with “hair spiders” when he finds them.
PHFHGHFHFHFHTTTT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(That would be me spitting water out all over the laptop while reading your blog at work).
The spider story is hilarious. I do not like spiders either, but I’ve lived in the country long enough to be able to tolerate them. At least your “spider” wasn’t one of my 3″ long, furry country spiders. Now those guys are scary.
oh lordy, scared shitless by your own hair. well, those primal instincts have to come out in some way or another!
I’m another one of us visionally challenged people, and I am forever seeing spiders in my shower. I think the last one was just a shadow.
I know the feeling. On our honeymoon, I woke my husband up in a panic when I looked up and saw a body floating in the hotel’s swimming pool (tanned back, flower print swim trunks) with splotches of blood trailing down the pool steps. I reasoned that the party by the pool the night before had gotten out of hand and someone must have hit their head… As I was calling the front desk (nearly hyperventilating) my husband pointed out that someone had knocked the huge clay pot planter filled with mums into the pool and the dirt had spilled on each step. Even now, it still looked like a body to me…
Have you thought about contacts? They could really help out in the shower/bath. I am practically blind without my corective lenses, so I tend to use contacts in the shower.
As a child, I too had only a clawfoot bathtub in our home.
I have a spider jar in my kitchen and practice catch-and-release. I’ve been told that killing a spider is bad luck, but in reality I find it easier to be a little spooked by a live spider in a jar than totally grossed out by a smashed spider with those legs everywhere.
My apartment only has a shower. I miss being able to soak in a tub, but on the other hand my landlord knocked a chunk of money off the rent because the unit doesn’t have a “full” bath. And I have friends that will let me soak in theirs when I need it.
Just a reminder. I live alone and I have learned, spiders die when HOT water hits them. The heat coming through the bottom of a coffee cut will also kill them. So if you turn the shower on hot and let it run, any spinders the water hits will be dead spiders. And, I am okay with dead spiders, [that is why we have vaccuum cleaters, right] and I own a shop vac just so I can suck dead wet spiders out of the shower.
Your travel blogs are never boring. I laughed till I had to run to the bathroom
Unfortunately, you know about as much about US geography as most people who go to school in the US know about US geography. You probably actually know more, because you’ve traveled some. When I lived in Connecticut, people would find out I lived in South Dakota and ask if I knew people who lived in towns that were half a days drive from where i lived. I have determined that people know the very least about SD, because at least they do understand that NORTH Dakota is at least North. Additionally, I was occassionally asked about Indian attacks and such!
I lived in Connecticut for 21 years and did not know until reading today’s blog that Madison had a shore line ;0…and it looks so lovely and inviting especially today…with Heat index, it’s 105 or thereabouts. As for the spider, or rather the hair, it sure looks like a spider. Better you than me. I’m sure I would have slipped and broken a bone or two trying to escape 😉 Kauni looks lovely.
Too funny! Your blog is the bright spot in my Monday 🙂
There’s just something about showers, isn’t there? Every once in a while I’ll find myself alone and showering when I think I hear a noise elsewhere in the house; if I just happen to be in the midst shampooing there is this horrible moment of panic until I can open my eyes again.
At our house we don’t get spiders much, but there will be an occassional slug! That’s when I yell to Hubby-Darling/Knight-in-Shining-Armor that “there’s a dragon in the shower!” He arms himself with toilet paper and slays the nasty, slimey beasty.
Keep on purlin’
oh you are just lurel and hardy
all wrapped in to one -now just
look at the mess you got yourself in
is there help for this person stay
tuned for next installment of
the the traveling accident
about to happen my dear you are a hoot
I can’t wait to read this post over and over for the next several days.
In case it makes you feel better, I showered with a tree frog once. Then, I brought it outside to release it and it ended up in my shower again, twice. We were only shower buddies the first time though.
Enjoy the happy pills! Please let someone else drive you to the airport and event.
You need to go to Paris — both times I’ve visited there, my hotel rooms had baths but not showers. Quite traumatic for my teen self — only babies and little kids took BATHS. Nowadays I would relish the excuse to soak …
Spiders and me, we have a treaty: they stay outside and/or out of sight, where they belong, and I won’t squish ’em. Those spiders who violate the treaty get what they deserve.
Yipes! I happened to read the part about you breaking a molar while I was eating ice cream – my tooth nerves did a sympathetic shudder, sending my spine right out the top of my back. My teeth feel for your teeth. I think I have to take medicine to make them stop.
Have fun in Halifax…I’m sure they can find something for you there to sooth your pain. 🙂
My mom once tried to towel herself off and discovered a baby lizard had jumped from the towel to her chest and was just staring at her from that ‘vantage point’. I don’t think I’ve ever heard someone scream so loud.
Thanks for the laugh and jogging that memory, cuz I so needed it today.
I’m an American and I love my country and my countrymen. However, geography is not our strong suit and I would have to say that as a Canadian you probably know as much about U.S. geography as most of us. My sister was ordering something from Sears that was to be sent to Vermont. When she gave the address, the girl asked “Is that in the United States?” And a friend of mine who lived in south Florida wanted his children to see snow one winter. So, he took them to Los Angeles.
Ha — a hair spider! You crack me up (in a good way, mind you)!
While we’re sharing spider/shower stories: I once had a very large spider drop down on my face while showering. I’m normally pretty calm about spiders. I’ll catch them in an overturned glass, slip a piece of firm paper underneath, and escort them outside. However, having a huge-ass spider plop onto your face unexpectedly is a totally different matter. I’m ashamed to say that my first reaction was to fling the spider toward the drain, where he was pounded mercilessly by the water and suffered fatal wounds (I really hate to kill things, so this made me quite sad when I had calmed down a bit). This shower had a heat lamp in the ceiling, and I’m pretty sure the spider was just bailing out of the space around it after noticing the increasing toastiness of his hideout. Poor guy.
I really enjoyed your talk in Madison last Friday. (I’m the one who was wearing the green tank top and linen pants getting a book signed for my Sockapalooza pal.) You had admired my top, and I wanted to let you know that it’s a free pattern called “Pencil Sketch Camisole” by the very generous and talented knitblogger Iris G ( http://irisgknits.blogspot.com/ ), if you’re interested in making one for yourself.
By the way, sorry about your tooth…
You have no idea how excited we are that you’re coming! We even made shirts for the “Knitting Out Loud” crew. ’cause we’re Geeks, all of us.
Is there anything you need while you’re here? A tour guide to the best coffee houses and yarn stores in HRM?
I’ve already emailed my contact at The Lord Nelson and warned him about how insane it’s going to be tomorrow night (I’m sucking up so that he’s nice to me during the event I’m organizing later this year). I think he’s sufficiently alert to the possibility of complete and utter wooly insanity.
Oh – and I had a spider-shower incident last month. It rapelled into my peripheral vision while I was shampooing my hair. I’m not scared of spiders, but being very near-sighted, it scared me to the point that I shrieked a la Psycho shower scene. It made my fingertips tingle.
I once spent several minutes talking to one of my furry black slippers because I thought it was my cat. So I can relate to being blind in the bathroom. Thanks for the laugh!
Oh, too, too funny! I can sympathize with the spider thing definitely. Give it some more practice, and I bet the Psycho music goes right out of your head!
:O)
once, when my daughter was little i put her in the punishment corner, there was a spider in it! once when my daughter was little i put her in the punishment corner at the fishing dock , then dropped a crab which scuttled toward her.
hehehe
I’ve showered all my life, and I still won’t wash my face in the shower b/c I’m afraid of being blinded by the soap….and I hate shower curtains. Doors are way better. Sorry about the tooth….
I’m sorry…I snorted.
Have fun in Halifax!! 🙂
Oh my goodness! I have had a shower all of my life, and a tub, but I love my showers! Unfortunately, our shower is out of commission right now (has been for MONTHS) and I miss it dearly. Our showerly bathroom needs a complete overhall/remodel, but alas other DIY projects are ahead of it.
I feel for you though when it comes to the “no glasses in the shower” thing as I, too, am blind without my glasses. Your “spider” story was a hoot!
I hope you come to my neck of the woods some day. Probably the closest you might venture would be Louisville, KY. Keeping my fingers crossed!
That spider was really funny!!!!!!! Sorry about the tooth. Tooth pain is not good!
There should be some kind of rule stating that people should not be drinking hot coffee while they read your blog……..
That would TOTALLY look like a spider in the shower without glasses. My teacher one time when I was…well, many years ago, had me take off my glasses and asked me if I could read the clock on the wall across the room. I said: What clock? I knew it was there, but I couldn’t see it. Now, similarly, I can no longer read the “E” at the eye test. I tell them I know it’s an E, but it could be an F or a square for all I know. This is followed by lots of “hummm-ing” on their part and flipping of lenses…..
About that spider — well, you didn’t have your glasses on.
Sorry about the molar. I have 8 (count ’em) crowns on my molars so I know what you speak of. $$$$$
Sorry about the Kauni. Are you sure it’s you? I’ve been reading some things (problems) about the yarn, especially the new 150 g skeins that sound sort of like what you’ve encountered though I’m sad to say, that does look like you screwed up.
LISA – Those socks are keepers, girl! I love that you stuck to it and knit the pair!
Sorry about the tooth. Thank god for the drugs.
Stay safe from the ‘spiders’ 🙂 That made me laugh so hard!
OMG….you MUST put a disclaimer on your blog. I nearly peed my pants from laughing so hard. You are hilarious!
MANDY, sorry, those are Mandy’s rockin socks!
This definitely one of the funniest things I have read in ages – and on a knitting blog for pete’s sake! What a hoot – our diversity is what makes life worth living, isn’t it? Amen!
My friend Chris calls those HAIR MONSTERS. And I guess in your case it really was one!
Good luck with your tooth issue, and with having a slightly less adventurous time in Halifax. 🙂
Spiders I can deal with. Hair I can deal with. It’s those big nasty hairy lookin’ millepedes or whatever those things are called that have freaked me out since I was a kid. They tended to crawl up the drains in the morning and I’d have to wash them down the drain before I could eat my breakfast. I thought it only happened at the shore, but no. It happens here at home in the city, too. *shudder* I don’t know how I can deal with them calmly when just the thought of the things is making my skin crawl right now… *shudder*
Sorry about your tooth. That sucks!
And OMG That girl’s first socks look like the socks I’m making for my husband. I swear the man has monster feet. Sadly my sister wore out the first pair of socks I ever made. They were a lovely example of why one should always, always, always check the guage.
Heh… it took me 5 minutes to figure out what was wrong with the Kauni. I guess PMS meds count as getting high, huh?
My geography classes were so long ago I get fuzzy trying to remember the states in the middle of the country. Never did understand the reason to memorize the state capitals, either. Weirdness.
My 10 year old son knows the ‘spider scream’ from his (older) sisters. Most of the time he will do ‘battle’ for them. We recently had one (big thing) living in the tracks of the window in the bathroom. She actually got a name. Finally my oldest bug sprayed her, since I was not going to battle her.
I am sorry about the sweater, but you enjoy knitting, right, you just get to do a bit extra. Have fun in Halifax.
I’m lusting after Rebecca’s shawl! Do you know where she got the pattern, or, if it was self-designed, whether she would be willing to share it with the rest of us?
I want you to know that I’m at work on break. I laughed so hard I cried and then had to dash for the bathroom when I realized I was going to pee my pants. Just picture me in steel toe sneakers giggling through a factory that makes gaskets. Imagine my office mates questions upon my return. I can imagine the wonderful yarn harlot soapy and without a stitch of wool running around her hotel room…
It made the afternoon go by faster though.
Hi Stephanie,
You had me laughing so hard, my coworkers came to my office to investigate what was going on. “Oh, nothing, just reading a knitting blog…” would not have been a good answer.
I, too, do not like spiders, but have learned (from my nature loving husband) to tolerate them. Tarantulas do not bother me. It’s the small ones (or big, as they appear), with the fast, unpredictable motion that get me.
Thank you for sharing!
Rosane.
P.S.: On the subject of your potentially boring posts about talks, knitters and new places, I find them very interesting, not boring at all. I love seeing the faces of the people who go to listen to you, all proud of their own work, all obviously in awe of you. Take care.
OK, I giggled discreetly when I read your story. I totally lost it when I read the comment about the lizard that got up close and personal with the commenter’s mother.
It pays to read the words, not just look at the pictures. Scanning, saw the word spider and the spider-esque picture. Squinting at it on my monitor, thinking, that sure is some crazy looking spider with long skinny legs. I never knew they had crazy weird spiders like that in Connecticut – I’d expect them somewhere more tropical. Then I read the post – (smacks head)
I am totally with you about hating to have glasses off for shower. Especially when I visit my Grandma in Florida where they really do have crazy big bugs and the occasional reptile sneaking in the house.
Interesting point you make about US Geography… You’re right, here in the U.S. we learn the geography and history of just about everywhere except Canada. I’m going to make sure that I do a special unit on Canada this year with my kids!
As for spiders and showers, I had a similar experience except that it was a very real spider and it was crawling up my leg. Not only that it was, I swear, a tarantula (we would see them not infrequently where we lived near the mountains). Now, in hindsight, it may have been a large garden spider… but either way, it was at least 2 1/2 inches in diameter (it wouldn’t even fit down the drain!) and very, very hairy. I broke out in anxiety induced hives later that day and developed some very thorough shower search rituals that stuck with me for many years.
That sort of thing never happens to people with MY hairstyle. Nyah nyah nyah.
The morning alarm clock blindness gets me more than the shower. So sorry to hear about your tooth. Ouch!
Laughing out loud is a very LOUD thing when one works as a receptionist in a foyer. Then I get to explain what I’m laughing so hard about and I get That Look. Like my coworkers didn’t already know I’m weird. 🙂
I can hardly tell the difference with the cardi, are you SURE you have to rip it out? Silly me, I already know the answer to that. You’re not the type to say it’s a design bonus, are you? It’s beautiful anyway, just so you know.
I don’t even know where to start… I am so used to living with spiders in my house that seeing one doesn’t bother me any more. After showering and before drying off, I always check the towels to make sure none are crawling on them. Occasionally there is one and even without my glasses I can see it. A quick shake gets it off the towel but then I’m a little freaked out until I see where it went.
I have the same treaty as SaraJoan. Spiders and bugs live outside. People live in houses. Don’t come in the house or you will die.
Great post! As someone who can imagine horrors at the drop of the hat I completely sympathize with the “spider”. As for hte Boston post- -that cute thing with the toe socks was something else. Wish I were 10 years younger or single!
You are honestly one of the most delightful writers around. Is it the drugs??? I think not. You’re just gifted. I depend on your entries for a good laugh.
You poor thing. I share your spider pain, although I’m an avowed showerer. After years of false-alarm screams & heart-attacks, I’m slowly training myself to look again & make sure there’s really a bug near me before I freak out. It’s a slow process….
I was with you on the whole crazed spider thingy until you said you didnt’ have your glasses on. I knew which beast was terrorizing you becuase I’ve been terrorized by the great hair fuzzy many a times without my glasses on. amazing thing them spectacles…
Oh..my..god..you might’ve have be looking in my window the way you’ve described the spider incident. I have run wet and naked through the apartment many times in a vain attempt to escape the hair “spiders”. I was immensely relieved when I finally got contact lenses that I can wear in the shower so I at least know when the spiders are real.
The boys suggest that you take cold showers with your glasses on. Cold = fast washing, and no fogging of the lenses to obscure spider patrol.
The house I grew up in only has a claw foot tub- no shower. I still take a bath about 3 days out of the week. I shower on the others.
I’m completely myopic, and if I don’t have my contacts in, I shower with my glasses on! If you take them off for a second when you first get in, and let the hot water run over them, they won’t steam up. And I can cope with the drips better than I cope with not being able to tell apart the colorful blobs on the shelf. 🙂
p.s. I’m with you on the spiders, except substituting earwigs. I once had a traumatic earwig proximity incident in one of the two showers in my house where we lived when I was in high school. I never used that shower ever, ever again, and you had to seriously bribe me to go in the room.
Ahhh, spiders in the shower. My 8yo stepson just yesterday said to me before getting into the shower I had turned on for him, “Beverly, can you make sure there are no spiders on the shower curtain before I get in?” Seems they crawl out of the drain so often that he’s gained a bit of fear of them lately. I just write them off as natural insecticide. Your story made me laugh, though, because I have on many occasions thought a clump of hair was a dead spider (and vice versa) due to my blind-as-a-mole-in-the-daylight-without-my-glasses status.
Paula’s comment about the mittens totally cracked me up. and spiders — why on earth do they live in showers? I mean what ELSE is living in there? cause they wouldn’t be in the shower if there wasn’t food in there. I try not to dwell on it.
I am so with you on the spider thing. I find them to be incredibly creepy and totally lose it if even a tiny one crawls on me. I’m so glad it turned out to be a false alarm. Have a wonderful time in Halifax!
It took me a very long time to see how you’d “arsed-up” the Kauni. Maybe you should just let it go? Your adventures are always so much more interesting than most. Try to come to Dallas on your way between Wichita and Houston, it’s right on the way.
I’m the Rebecca with the shawl. It’s the Azalea pattern from the First Book of Modern Lace Knitting (by Marianne Kinzel). She meant for you to stop at some kind of wacky table-topper size (or before that, at a coaster) but I just kept going. There are more pictures on my blog, if you scroll back to Saturday.
Also–it doesn’t take much distance not to know about the surprising presence of oceans in CT. I grew up (and learned geography) in upstate NY and am constantly amazed to find myself near a beach now that I live here.
Total empathy on the spider thing. I always figure, if I can see it without my glasses, the thing must be HUGE!
hi! I sympathize entirely. I have no problem showering in my own home, but I have been seriously creeped out by thinking of that shower scene at inopportune moments – and I have never even seen the entire film, just that scene. As for spiders, they don’t entirely send me screaming, but I often wish they would keep themselves to themselves a little better.
My mother is still a bath (versus shower) afficionado. She washes her hair bending over the kitchen sink. I remember having to do that when I had a cast on my leg for a while in high school, and it was a real drag (maybe that is why she keeps her hair short?).
This must be a summer of teeth – I have had a new crown this summer as well. It first cracked during our knitting group’s anniversary potluck – and it was something soft I was eating, really!
Lastly, when I was in college in upstate New York I had friend from out West – Montana and Idaho. There were lots of folks there who would lump the three of us together as being from out west – and I was from Ohio! I guess geography must be one of those “use it or lose it” skills. If you don’t travel much and don’t need it for school or a quiz show, you just seem to forget it!
but baths are… icky and time consuming and weird!! poor dear… The thing is in a bath, you can’t really drown the spider and hope it goes away since the water is standing (nevermind that you are sitting in dirty water since you are dirty and the water doesn’t drain), in a shower… get it with the shower head! RAWR!
I want to know one thing-do you knit in the bath?
Actually, I had a similar horror from BATHing! Somehow I got convinced as a child that I could get washed down the drain, and that got convoluted with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and the fish heads and some monster living in the basement… I’m ok now, but I get it, even though I really do feel better when showering. After all, it’s easier to run out of a shower, since you’re already standing up!
As far as the spider thing is concerned, educating myself about which spiders live in my area and which ones you need to be aware of is really the only way I deal with that. They do creep me out, but I only freak when I know they’re dangerous…or don’t know them at all…or they surprise me. I like anything that eats bugs, you know? Bugs…ugh.
No knitting while taking drugs from the dentist. Your brain will be too scrambled. Good luck with the tooth!
Leah was delighted to give you her hat pattern on Friday and SQUEE’d when I showed her a picture of herself on your blog. Our blog entry about the evening is at
http://livnletlrn.blogspot.com/2007/08/muggles-of-madison.html
Thanks for a delightful mom-and-daughter knit nite out together. 🙂
This is a public service announcement:
I once was drying off in the tub after a shower when I spotted a large bug. Which wasn’t a problem until it started to move toward me. In trying to leap out of the tub, I slipped and fell and cracked my ribs on the side of the tub.
Trust me, the pain of broken ribs last a lot longer than the terror of a bug or the pain of any bug bite.
Rebecca of the shawl again, with the direct link: http://archiknist.blogspot.com/2007/08/p1010013.html
Dude, it’s only 5 rows. On a sleeve. You can handle this. (Once you come down from your tooth-drug high.)
O’course, nothing can touch my almost-done-with-Swallowtail high. Nothing.
What would we do without you? I lost it about the hairy spider. That was too funny. I don’t mind spiders myself, but NOT naked without my glasses.
I wonder how long it will take for Greg Kinnear to find your blog? You should see the hits already coming up when you Google “kinneared” or “kinnearing”.
The Halifax contingent are so freaking excited. Dude, we made t-shirts. I’m putting my kids in daycare and making a day of it. I’ve talked to people who are traveling from 4+ hours away.
I say the above not to freak you out, but to instil in you what a good, good thing it is that you’re coming.
Peeing kittens until we meet on the fair coast,
Deb B. in Truro, NS
I had a similar tooth disaster recently, with the same financial/stash enhancement conflict, and in fact the tooth is still in mid-repair stage. One good thing: after the initial “crown-lengthening” procedure (don’t ask) I could do nothing but knit for three days. Actually, I probably could have, but no one else needed to know that. I was forced to top up the sock yarn afterwards, but as you’ve always said, sock yarn doesn’t count as stash.
Have a great time in Halifax!
I know that I should be very sympathetic but I love when you admit your mistakes. Because then I don’t feel so stupid with my mistakes! You are human. I laughed alot about the spider incidence! Sorry about your molar. Tooth repair/dental bills are the pits!
Do you ever find yourself walking through an unseen spider web outside, and then shrieking, flailing and swinging about like a complete nutjob? Yeah, I do that quite a bit. The worst part is you never know if the spider was on the web at the time. Yuck – gives me the creeps just thinking about it!!
There should be a law against spiders in naked places! I came face to face with the biggest hairiest spider I’d ever seen while on the toilet. The bastard was on the toilet paper! I reached over and as I rolled some out, he came up over the back. “Lost my shit” takes on a very literal meaning. 🙂
Looked like a spider to me- a water-logged daddy long legs. I think frogs in the shower are worse- they stare (from my living in South America days)
Spiders and I have an agreement. They stay out of my sight (the basement, dark corners, under the couch) and I let them live. When they chase me across the living room, they get a shoe dropped on them. If they should actually get on me, they get an ear piercing scream, wildly shaken and smashed with whatever is handy.
We have wolf spiders here. I’ve seen them with bodies as big as teaspoons. My cat kills them and lines them up by the dining room rug, as if they were mice.
Good kitty.
Even better is when you jump out of bed screaming, waking your sleeping husband, who also jumps about 15 feet into the air. And while you’re cowering in the corner gasping “spider, spider,” he flicks the harmless piece of lint off the bed and gives you a murderous look.
Or so I’ve heard.
At the risk of sounding snide (I don’t mean it that way at all), this post made me realize something: I am very, very brave. I used to routinely have to shower with spiders, as my former house was overrun with them. And now, of course, I frequently have to kill centipedes (much larger and ickier than your average spider because they have far more LEGS, and they do that awful wiggle when they walk) before I can get in the shower (or while I am in the shower).
You, of course, are very brave to share such a story with your large readership. Especially the hair-punchline.
Oh, poor Stephanie!
My husband does this thing when some of his dark, curly hairs are freed during his showers (he does not “lose” hairs, they are “freed”, this is an important distinction, apparently), where he rolls them between his hands into a little fuzzy ball, “intending” to throw them away. Strangely enough, that never seems to happen, and instead I am constantly having to do spider/hair wad patrol before entering the shower lest I freak myself out utterly over, well, a wad of hair.
Also, to be honest – when I’m in a strange shower, I just keep my glasses on. Getting wet won’t hurt them, and wet glasses is far preferable to being left alone, half-blinded, in a white noise chamber in a strange place with nothing but my imagination for company.
Oh, the hair spider thing . . . has happened to me more than once, don’t feel bad. Of course, we’re not supposed to be afraid of spiders, since we knitters/spinners/weavers are all the daughters of Arachne, and therefore the spiders are our sisters. (Yes, I am scared silly of spiders even though it’s totally irrational, especially in the shower. Yes, I have killed them even though I am a committed vegetarian for ethical reasons and they are my little spinning “sisters.” They are icky, okay?)
Just think of showers as opportune rain showers, except with warm water. And soap handy. And towels. And privacy.
Mmmm, Stephanie?
Considering the cost of this “tooth thing” which is partly our fault for scaring you with a spider/shower combination, we could throw YARN at you instead of drawers.
Just a thought.
Anything in particular that you wouldn’t mind seeing flung at you in wild abandon when you get to Atlanta. Other than skeins and NOT cones, mind you.
Do they have the Tooth Fairy in Canada?
Ginny
Oh, the horror! What you have about spiders, I have about shower hairs. I could spend an afternoon with a gigundo arachnid, but give me a wad of hair … ooo, I have to go lie down now.
You think you’re bad at American geography? I thought New England was a state, and my American Mainer boyfriend thought this was really fun and lead me on for a while to think it was true.
We are all really excited here in Halifax to see you!!
I have admittedly mistaken hair at the bottom of the shower for menacing spiders and appropriately freaked out or screamed. (same for large lint balls or cat fluff late at night.. what can I say? I’m almost blind without the specs!)
Sorry about your tooth–that is a major bummer, especially since it will cut into your yarn buying for a while!
It was so nice to meet you at the event. I hope you had fun here in CT, in spite of the spider/hair incident. Hopefully you will come back soon. 🙂
Yick – hair spiders in the shower! Being semi-blind and living at the edge of country, I have to give 2-3 looks to those things to be absolutely sure. There is a spider or wiggly thing in the tub at least twice a week too; I just look for it, squish it, clean and draw the bath. Funny, HA, I cracked a tooth about an hour ago, unbelievable.
Have a fabulous time at the classic gorgeous hotel in Halifax – now that looks like fun!
‘Tis a sad day when the Harlot is brought down by a Kuni AND a hair spider. 🙂
My husband said he’d learn to knit something if he could be photographed with THE SOCK. How he enjoys the sock photos.
Ouch, a cracked molar sucks.
I think I would not like mornings at your house. I need my shower in order to survive. I have a thing about soap scum floating on the water. Although being trapped in a shower stall with a hair spider might change my mind about that.
Halifax! Lucky you. You’ll fit right in with that fun loving crowd stoned or not.
I haven’t laughed so hard since the “towel to the hotel lobby” story… You have nailed the integration of text to pics and building suspense!
(I am totally with you on the spider thing — though I’ve been told that seeing them means you have to be more creative, and they are the patron of knitters and weavers…Whatever, they’re terrifying)
Spiders are your friends. Really. They eat mosquitoes. Well, I don’t think the Black Widow Spiders eat mosquitoes, so we stomp on them, but the others eat mosquitoes and wool moths so we love them and never smash them.
whew! can’t stop laughing long enough to type straight! ok, under control…
1- those big a** socks are just hilarious! bless you, wonky sock knitter (from someone who has yet to attempt sock knitting for just that reason)
2-that shawl is achingly beautiful
3-i’ve heard of hairy spiders, but really! HAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
4-have a fantastic time in our beautiful maritimes. sigh…… can i come too?
Hilarious post.
I just have to contribute my own shower-spider incident.
The setting: a getaway weekend at a lovely country inn with my husband of 10 months. The main character: me, blind as a bat without my specs, hugely and nakedly pregnant with twins, showering happily in a beautiful old clawfoot bathtub behind a curtain on a ring. Action: the hairspider attacks, and the fat lady leaps with crazed abandon out of the tub, and runs faster than a speeding hippopotamus out of the shower and nearly out the door of the suite.
I thought my husband was going to die laughing.
I still haven’t lived it down. And that was 18 years ago!
I do not shower either (also due to seeing Psycho, at a high school slumber party). Besides, as you mentioned, you can relax in the tub with a glass of something and a book. It’s the one place the family doesn’t bother me , too. When my family are home, I can bathe with the bathroom door closed like a normal person but, when in the house alone, I have to have the door open so that I can hear anyone breaking in. For more security, I prefer to have my dog lying right next to the tub.
Thank you for sharing your spider experience!!! I needed a good laugh. I actually like spiders, especially the jumping ones.
I understand about the spider. You did what you had to do. No shame in that.
Gosh. I always thought that kids in Canada had a much better handle on US geography than US kids do on Canadian – or US, for that matter. Glad you got a pleasant surprise with the water.
I totally understand about the spider thing. Heck, I thought that picture _was_ of a spider at first. My sympathies on the freak-out. I’d have done the same except I’m so blind I wouldn’t have seen it at all without my glasses.
If you really need something easy to work on with the tooth drugs and all I’ve got some simple seaming up that’s been sitting around for a couple of months now. A perfectly good sweater I can’t wear because it’s still in four pieces. I hate sewing up.
I’m stupid excited about you coming to Halifax as well. See you tomorrow!
…? I’m really confused- I thought that Canada had free/very affordable health care- especially after seeing “Sicko” does this NOT include dental work?
I love Madison and RJ Julia. One of the last independent book stores around. I also love that stretch of Rte 1. Its cool to think that it stretches from Maine all the way to Key West in Fla. Wish I could have come to see you. Jeremy
How does one wash their hair in a bath? The first time I used a Euro-style bath tub with a shower attachment, I managed to flood the floor with an inch of water (2.5cm)… The entire floor.
Just curious. Also, feel free to keep your glasses on. They just get wet and you can wipe them off after, you know.
There, there, Steph. I’ll send you some sock yarn and you can knit me some of your famous plain-vanilla socks. :o) I promise it’ll be nice, soft, wool sock yarn . . . maybe with some bamboo in it, or something hand dyed . . .
Oh, and Mandy’s first socks could be GREAT slippers for a pony . . . or a small elephant . . .
I hate showers.
In high school, we had to be able to write each country’s name, capitol, a few other major cities, and some major geographic features into blank world maps… This, however, seems to have been an uncommmon experience for a high school student in the USA.
I was snorting out loud while reading your bit about the shower and the spider! I also prefer baths (looking forward to moving to my new house where the water heater will actually HEAT ENOUGH WATER to fill the tub — woohoo!), and am completely with you about the whole spider thing. As a gardner, I too can cope with the fact that they have a useful purpose and therefore a right to exist. Just. Not. ANYWHERE. Near. Me!!!
Looks, ahem, like a few more than thirty knitters. I don’t suppose anyone was petty enough to rub RJ Julia’s nose in it? No, of course not — I wasn’t there. (Though my knee-jerk reaction that Raul Julia of blessed memory is involved was an incentive…)
Oh no – I can definitely sympathise with your being traumatised without your glasses. I can only see about 2 inches without my glasses and I astonish myself with what I think I can see (usually scary things) that later turn out to be piles of clothes etc. I once got very frightened by my hairbrush on the bathroom floor. I promise it looked like a hairy mouse type hedgehog thing that should not have been in the bathroom but it seemed not to be trying to eat me after I threw the shampoo bottle at it and it didn’t squeak or run away and I got enough courage to go and hunt for my glasses!
here are my first finished socks. check out those lovely heels. what you can’t see are the holes on the soles from my little short row set up for my heel flaps. and i had to duplicate stitch BOTH socks in the same spot to cover a big hole where the heel flap becomes the cuff. (they are toe ups)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7175157@N06/1032423558/in/photostream/
I’m totally a shower person (I don’t get how I’m supposed to rinse myself off in a bathtub full of water I’ve already washed myself in. What am I missing?), but I don’t like shower stalls. Too claustrophobic. So give me a bathtub where I can take a shower. And I just talk to the spiders (they spin! They’re your friends!), but I sense I am in a distinct minority. Oh well, I’m used to that.
It’s a brave woman who will admit to her most embarassing moments.
If it makes you feel any better, it took me three tries to buy a stamp today. (Long story.)
And I’m still sore from my first 2 dentist appointments (one left to go.) But I’m just taking advil.
It’s a good thing I don’t have a thing about spiders in the shower because for some reason spiders constantly appear in the hall bathroom at my parents’ house, the one I used growing up. At some times of year you just took for granted that you were going to have to remove at least one spider before you bathed or showered.
I actually missed one once and was bitten on the instep by a spider while taking a shower. Of course, it was a stupid move on the part of the spider, since my instinctive reaction when I felt the bite was to shake my foot, and when I did the spider fell off and drowned.
I thought Canadians had a form of socialized medicine so you wouldn’t have to pay through the nose for things like dental problems (which we do). Much sympathy for that. Been there. Done that. Paid the bill. And paid and paid…
My vet nicknamed her cats “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” it was very appropriate. I’m with you on both showers and spiders. My x never believed me that there were spiders “as big as my hand” in BC until one crawled out of the shower at my Aunts… just as he was about to step in. Oh the shouting… I don’t think I’ve ever mistaken my hair for one though… LOL
I can hardly believe I’m about to admit this in public but… One night last winter I saw a HUGE spider on the dimly-lit hall floor. I was on my way to bed, my contacts were out, I didn’t have my glasses on, but, feeling similarly to you regarding the 8-leggers, I couldn’t just leave it there to stalk me after I was in bed. So I called my trusty dog, who has learned to sniff and scare and sometimes dispose of icky critters at my urging. He trotted over, sniffed, and looked at me confused. I pointed again, he sniffed again. The spider didn’t move. After a few more repetitions (my dog is very patient and understanding) I finally sidled close enough to look for myself – the “spider” was a tangled end of yarn…
sheesh.
I am TOTALLY with you on the spider thing! Once when I came home and found a gargantuan spider in the middle of my living room floor, I immediately went running up the stairs away from it, screaming. However, I was all the while looking over the banister to make sure it didn’t get away, and smacked my head on the ceiling of the living room where it met the banister. I was seeing stars after that! But I still wouldn’t come downstairs until my roommate killed the little intruder; and then she brought me some ice. 🙂
Goodness, why did Mary have to go to the hospital (although her hubby is a double-dear!)?
And the term is “arachnophobe.” I used to have a roommate in college who was deathly afraid of spiders (she used to clean everything in sight if she even saw a cobweb). I used to contemplate little spiders to get her to clean our dorm room!
Your hair! Too funny! At least your molar waited until you were home and didn’t bust apart right there on top of your hair and get washed down the shower drain. There’s a good reason folks fear spiders, some of them can kill ya! And don’t listen to those that say ‘such and such a spider doesn’t occur this far north’. My pal’s mother in law lost her leg to a brown recluse bite, but they don’t occur here in Maine…
Like you need people double-posting, but I thought people would appreciate this. [g] A fanfic writer known as Rogue uses a *perfect* acronym for spiders: NAPON
Which stands for “Nasty-Assed Pieces Of Nature”.
I consider this one of the greatest contributions ever made by fanfic to world heritage. Someone should nominate that woman for a medal, at the very least!
You need to add ‘The Unexplainable’.
You BLOGGED this and you know you were thinking, “I’m so blogging this!!” as it was happening.
We really are a twisted breed. *grin*
That is hilarious!
well, goodness! I knew there was another reason I liked you! We have been a bath family since we moved in here and there was NO shower. We even conserve water,….I go first, then Hubby and then the designated small child last. (Larger teens use the shower downstairs). We finally put a shower head in the clawfoot tub about 13 years ago, but never have used it. The official shower is downstairs, put in about 10 years ago. I could never give up my reading in the bath, and you can talk on the phone and do all sorts of things while relaxing in there. I understand the spider thing- just remember, they aren’t interested in you.
Mary
Y’know most people take their pants off rather than putting them on when taking a shower….
I’ve been showering for years and still flip out when the water runs right over my face. Spiders? That is what the shower water is for – wash em down the drain. They can’t climb back out, honest.
Broken molar? OWWWEE!
You had me laughing so hard with the “spider” encounter. That was too funny. Glad that it wasn’t real.
Anybody know what pattern that is that Rebecca used for her shawl? Or was that her own design?
Yesterday I ended up going on an unexpected ambulance ride, and my boyfriend kept asking me, “do you want to bring your knitting???” which, while exceptionally sweet, was unfortunately the last thing on my mind. Then when we got to the ER he walked in with not only my knitting, but a tape measure to boot. Now THAT’S thoughtful.
Also, your spider-hair incident is the first thing that’s made me laugh all day, for which I am deeply grateful. 🙂
I had a similar – but different – experience. I also am pretty blind without my glasses. Bent over in the shower to pick up what I thought was hair – and instead picked up a spider! Screamed, ran (and squooshed) – but still take showers!
Love your blog, and books!
Laughing is SO GOOD. Too, too funny, in the “jeez, that could have been me” kind of way. Thanks for sharing, and have a grand time in Halifax!
Thinking about the woman who talked to her slipper is making me laugh out loud even as I type! Again, “jeez…”
I am so feeling a kinship with you now. I too dread showers and prefer baths. Unfortunately I live with a self-proclaimed comedian who believes it’s funny to rip back the curtain and yell loudly while I’m bathing or showering. For some reason it’s awlays worse in the shower though. And as for spiders? Well… let’s just say they aren’t my favorite of critters. And the jokesters abound in our home. Hence this entry
www.http://heideho.wordpress.com/2007/01/22/hi-diddly-ho-neighbor/ from back in January. At least you didn’t call the front desk and complain about needing an exterminator. Can you imagine the horror of having a maintenance person fish out a hair ball? Hope the rest of your tour goes well.
When we went to Botswana we discovered the Mosquito Spider. These babies are about an inch and a half (40 mm) in diameter and spotted. They’re quite fearsome looking.
The accommodations were tents on concrete pads, with the bathroom areas walled with bamboo screens. At night, when I’d walk into the bathroom and flip on the light there’d be a bunch of these spiders who would instantly slip into the bamboo screens. As I’d sit there, I’d know they were all around me.
Fortunately, they’re very shy of people and do their best to stay hidden while they eat all sorts of nasty flying insects. Not that that eased my mind much, though.
OMG!! I just get to the spider part and I have to stop and run down the hall and save a life. How can you concentrate on blood pressures when you are thinking, “was it a spider? Looked like hair” That will teach me to read your blog at work. Very relieved to see that someone else’s first socks looked just like mine. I’m saving mine for the day they finally find “Big Foot”. To be fair must I now knit a scarf for Loch Ness?? Inquiring minds want to know….
I love reading your blog and all the comments! I run screaming at the sight of moths, who knows why. And of course on our camping trip last week the world’s largest moth fluttered into our tent! And of course it was the night my husband was gone backpacking with his brother and sister! I had to trap it in a big cup and set it free by myself – ugh! I try not to kill insects, but they are yucky, no two ways about it.
I now have to google Greg Kinnear since I have no idea who he is and the suspense is killing me.
Good luck with your tooth – you have my sympathies there.
Hey, Steph – you’re over 10 years younger than me, which must explain why you didn’t have to study US geography in your Canadian school. I had to be able to place all the contiguous states on a map and know their capitals. I did *not* have to do that for Canadian provinces! In fact, I don’t think we ever got Canadian geography at all, but I learned it anyway by travelling cross-country a few times.
Despite all this education I mainly associate Connecticut with “Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House” – ah, the power of the movies.
I only bathe, too, and I feel your pain about the shower. Nasty, rushing, hurrying things, they are.
i used to prefer baths. but then i realized that- while they are indeed relaxing- you can’t really get clean by soaking in a tub. you’re pretty much just stewing in your own filth, ha. when i need to get clean, the water has to run down my body and down the drain.
I so understand about the hair spider. I require glasses (or contacts) to see pretty much anything more than 3 inches away from me. I know. It’s bad. And my great fear are roaches and those gross big waterbug things that have wings, but thankfully don’t really seem to fly very much. Or at least I’ve never seen one of them fly. Thank god! So, I’ve had the hair roach scare many, many a time.
But that Kauni. That is fantabulous. Even with a few mishaps along the way. I’ve discovered drinking and knitting to not work for me. I love it at the time, but it always gets frogged the next day. Always.
Cheers!
oh, and for the americans who’ve asked:
dental work is most certainly not free in canada!! unless your work covers is, you pay through the nose (or through the tooth?) for it.
take michael moore with a grain of salt . . .
You are very funny. The pictures look great and the gathering looked like it was very crowded by crafty people. Thanks for sharing
You’ve missed the most important part of the Kauni – you’re almost an inch from finishing. That’s wonderful! You’re an inspiration to knitters who lack “stick-to-it-iveness”, just remember that 🙂
Streaking around in strange hotel rooms just did me in . Thanks for your great posts . Have a great time in Halifax.
Not a big fan of spiders in the shower either but then to find out it’s your own hair. That’s just too cruel.
I laughed so hard at your shower story! I have done the exact same thing with hair in the tub and no glasses on.
Ouch! I hope you-and-your-tooth (and the budget!) recover soon.
Much symapathetico to the evil sweater pattern that is vexing you, but….dude…(as my 6 year old would say) spiders are nothing compared to 6 inch cocroaches or the 9 inch centipedes in the tropical showers or bathrooms…..
so be glad you live and move in a temperate climate for many reasons that have to do with more than the opportunity to use wool a lot…
I think your adventures are quite interesting. Just sayin’.
I, personally, am NOT about the spiders either. That’s why my husband is the mighty spider slayer in our house. I’m of the “once you cross the threshold, you’re dead meat” when it comes to bugs in the house.
Ouch, a cracked tooth!!! That completely bites (hardy har har)Good luck with that. My husband once had to have a fake tooth put in the front but had to wait for it. He ran around for about a month with this little tooth nub (front tooth) It was pretty funny looking.
I grew up with only a bathtub-a big cast iron with lion’s feet legs. I loved to wallow around in it but felt very “poor” because we didn’t have a shower like all my friends. My parents still have and use that tub-but I did get a shower installed for them after I left home and had some money that wasn’t necessary for rent or food.
If you like a good bath you would love a hot tub.
We use ours most nights before bed-the warmth and the jets really help us to sleep better and in Toronto you could use it almost year round-this hot spell is keeping us out but by Sept. we will be in to our chins again.
I don’t have a thing about showers but I personally detest spiders anywhere near me. I laughed until I cried about your experience in the shower! Isn’t there such a thing as fog-proof glasses?
Baths are best.
It’s sad when you own hair tries to terrify you. After all you’ve done for it.
(seems like you’re pretty simple right now–teehee)
(but hard to knit yourself)
I myself mandolined off the end of my (right) thumb and then got a tetanus shot tonight. I can’t even simple knit. Sheesh.
To be fair, that bit of hair really does look like a spider. I used to sic our old dog on spiders. If she could reach them, she would dispatch them for me. Good doggy!
About the shower? I totally identify! Even in those fancy showers with corners, doors, and lights, I still expect Norman Bates to show up.
About the spider? I remember my mother being trapped by TWO spiders when she was going upstairs to put away laundry. She had to stay there, all but crying, until someone came home to kill one. And, mind you, this was in a place where there were no poisonous spiders. A phobia is a phobia is a phobia.
Enjoy Halifax. Had I known your plans, I would have been there when you were. I just came back from there, and really can’t justify another trip this summer.
Katherine
Total empathy on spiders! They scare the beans outta me and hubby gets mighty-hubby duty 😀
Ouch on the molar! Hubby just had to deal with getting root canal work and a crown and after all his research GET A GOLD CROWN! They tend to last at least ten years and many last thirty-five or longer! Dentists ALWAYS get gold!
/rant off 😀
Best of all possible luck to you!!
Um…how do you wash your hair in a bath without then getting completely covered in soapy water and climbing out of the bath all soapy?
So, you know once in a while if you are having one of THOSE days and you just need something to snap you out of it? I was having one until just now. Thank you for helping me laugh today, Steph.
Ugh. I loathe spiders too. I remember when I was sitting in the front passenger seat and bawling my eyes out because a 1/2 cm spider was about 10 cm from my face. I just could not move to save my life.
PS: HoneyBee66 and Feminist Mafia were the brilliant ladies who thought of the Great Panty Toss. I was just the little soldier who thought to get them while I was out shopping. 🙂
Arse. Good east coast word. You’ll fit right in.
Just had to offer my condolences on the broken tooth and the dental bills. I broke off my front two teeth underneath my crowns back in February and since then have endured 6 months of dental work (including a 13 hour and an 8 hour visit as highlights) and a $32,000 bill. Thankfully your bill should be smaller than that! I understand the need for yarn, can I send you some to tide you over?
Good Luck at the dentist!
Spiders are good. They eat moths. Embrace the spider.
I have tons of them in my studio. If they do not eat moths, do not tell me, or I shall also lose ~my~ s**t.
Knit washcloths. I’m having a drive. I need your washcloths.
being the designated spider killer in my house with two daughters, taught me a rather large sense of stupid courage, and a huge dose of humor.
thank you for a new story to add to the many spider hunts I have encountered.
sorry I wasn’t there to stomp on it for you – and I hope that your tooth is easily fixed and painfree soon.
((hugs))
Re: Showers
It’s fine to put on your big girl panties and deal with it, but even those of us who prefer showers don’t wear panties in there. My condolences on the pseudo spider. When I don’t have my glasses on everything seems to have a much bigger perimeter/circumference. Hope your molar is quickly repaired and that a new book advance allows purchase of vast quantities of yarn.
You just might like showers better if you took the big girl pants off first. Just sayin’.
And? Ray Whiting wants to be your hat dude in Houston — he hasn’t heard from you yet, so give him a holler at his link on http://www.knitivity.com
Spiders, schmiders. Try sharing your shower with a two-inch long flying roach.
Better your spider incident than mine… no contacts, saw a knot of hair in the dog’s bowl (presumably fallen from a towel out of the dryer) and picked it up to throw away… AND IT MOVED!! I’m not arachnophobic, but I flung it into the next galaxy!
So sopping wet big girl panties don’t work, huh? At least you had plenty more nice new ones.
Is Madison, Connecticut a major city? I still have trouble remembering if Charlotte is in North or South Carolina and am not convinced Ohio is Midwest not East.
I really thought the photo was of a dead Daddy Long Legs. I spent my early youth in Sedona, Arizona (no where near a beach, but rather mid-desert) with tarantulas, wolf spiders, daddy long legs, scorpions, and rattle snakes plus a father who carried them all around in shoe boxes in his truck, but I still wouldn’t want to share a shower that cramped with one.
A word of warning – at the time of year you tend to come to Seattle we often have little green inchworms that hang from the trees on invisible threads. Now those will make me jump.
PS I forgot to tell Mary what a lovely, thoughtful husband she has. I know from my time as a nurse how wonderfully comforting a familiar passtime is to have at hand even when you can’t actually do it — and how loved ones often don’t think of that in the stress of the moment.
Plus I have a lovely husband who snickered at the story without any editorializing on my part.
I totally love you… I laughed until I cried. The perfect way to end my day, knowing we’re all so very human, and knowing at least one person has the guts to admit it out loud.
I went to school in the USA in the 70s. They thought we’d naturally choose to learn what we needed to learn. I didn’t get a single geography class from 6th grade until HS graduation, though my brother 2 years later had to take 9 weeks’ worth. Thank goodness in College I had a three week world Geography class. Yup. Three weeks.
And I’m with you on baths. We have a 1920’s claw-footed tub, super deep, the best luxury in our modest home. I’m funny about showers but didn’t ever see Psycho… I think for me it’s an aversion to being splashed. I had a brother, and I went on too many canoe trips where I ended up splashed and then submerged against my will.
I am OK with spiders if they don’t move so fast I can’t track where they are. However, once in a rental apartment a huuuuge cockroach came up on the plumbing from the downstairs apartment (I didn’t have them in my kitchen, just the bathroom). I am all about peace and nonviolence, I don’t eat mammals and I catch flies and take them outside. The cockroach? I smooshed him, then totally grossed out, then apologized to him.
I’m a bath person, too. You can read, and you don’t have to stand up. What’s not to like?
I’ll see you in Halifax!
Wouldn’t we all love someone like Mary’s husband who knows how badly she will need a knitting bag. That man has her priorities right.
I could send you my second ugly sock to knit on, sure to help with the knitting mojo…
I understand (and sympathize with) the “spider in the shower” drama. I’m terrified of spiders, too. And a lifetime of nearsighted beyond belief. At age 58, I had cataract surgery in both eyes, with implanted lenses. One of the first neat differences I noticed was that I could clearly see my feet in the shower, something I’d never seen before!!
My own spider in the shower story is remarkably similar, except mine involved one of these:
http://www.australianfauna.com/huntsmanspider.php
and it was dangling on a thread slipping on the steamy wall above my head. Again, no glasses.
My housemate will never forget how he woke up that day…..
Sad that you’ll never visit us here in Australia.
Well I’m guessing you won’t after seeing the Huntsman. 😉
Wish I could zip to Halifax for the night but the timing just isn’t right, so I’ll have to catch you next time. I’m sure the HRMers — esp those krazy KOLers — give you the warm east coast welcome you deserve. If you’re ever in Fredericton…I’ll be happy to show you the town.
Oh my! Laughing here over the spider/shower. I can totally relate. I can’t stand spiders which makes me a big target for them of course.
Many years ago I woke in the middle of the night to find one (big as a small dog) it was sitting right at eye level on my bicep. I swear it’s eyes were glowing! Much screaming, flailing and cowering in the the corner. My poor husband (former Green Beret) was not amused He went into jungle killer mode thinking we were under serious attack by another planet or something equally huge.
So sorry about the tooth. Dentist bills seriously eat into the stash budget. Bummer
That island in the backdrop of your picture? Tunxis Island: By 1695 there were 30 families in the new East Guilford colony, and around 1699 it was well on it’s way to becoming an independent colony. The people of the colony had an interesting folk tale regarding the formation of Tunxis Island and Tunxis Pond. It seems that there was a giant who lived in this area and one day he had stepped in some mud, and when he had pulled his foot out some of the mud stuck to it. This formed Tunxis Pond. His wife wouldn’t let him in the house with mud on his foot, so he washed it off in Long Island Sound. This formed Tunxis Island.
I learned how to swim at West Wharf Beach. There is also East Wharf (not as scenic), and the Surf Club (hang-out city).
Growing up, we only had a claw-foot tub and no shower, so I too share your “bathing, not showering” mentality. As I gear up for this baby (any day), I’m taking long baths every day before they say “showers only for weeks” … 🙂
Looks like you’re having fun on this leg of the tour!
I did laugh out loud until you got to the spider bit….yep I’m a spider hugger and an ex-spider-phobic. Compare your size, weight and vibration to the spiders ….who is gonna be more terrified – a (guessing here) 5ft something petite lady or a 2″ spider?
Everywhere I go I ask people not to kill them…..please. If you stamp/shout normally a spider will head in the opposite direction as it will see you as a threat and leg it x 8. Unless you get a real, killer psychotic one, with axes, knives and maybe a blow pipe – but happily – I don’t think there are many of them 😛
Oh and better not ever visit my blog – I post pictures of my pets there and there is even one in my blog banner….*sigh* never gonna get a visit from Yarn Harlot.
Hope your tooth is all healed soon.
Thanks for that big guffaw you gave me this morning.
Okay enough of the lame excuse. I may not have been taught anything about US geography in the Canadian school system, but they did teach me how to use an Atlas and a map. You are doing the rest of us a disservice with your self proclaimed ignorance.
I wouldn’t worry too much about the geography thing. I grew up in the states and I just recently realized New England isn’t a state! I live in VA (can’t WAIT til Sept 20th!!!!!) and had to ask a friend where Ohio is. So, they don’t necessarily teach U.S. Geography to us either! (and just to allay any suspicions that I’m a complete moron, I scored a 1410 on my SAT’s!–of course, that was back when dinosaurs roamed!)
Don’t knit anything more complicated than plain stst or garter when you’re on the drugs your dentist gives you. It’s badness waiting to happen. For the love of wool, just put it down!
Ah, yes, the “spider” in the shower. I have experienced this as well, though as an experienced showerer and invertebrate zoologist, it not nearly as traumatic for me. But ask me to call strangers on the telephone from the top of a very tall building or the edge of a sheer cliff and I will cry – possibly also scream like a very afraid thing.
If it weren’t so hot, I’d offer a nice cup of chamomile and catnip tea. It’s so calming, you’ll be unconscious before you see the bottom of your cup.
Talk about HAIR-y spiders!
You really should issue drink warnings!! Good thing I didn’t have coffee in hand!
I nearly forwarded it to dh but…well, he wouldn’t understand. It’s a knit thing.
I went home after reading this (having done the spider in the bathtub thing without my glasses – many times), sat down to knit, looked up at the wall where ran a stinking big spider – a stinking.big.spider. We had an agreement – spiders outside, me inside – but the treaty was broken and I don’t think he survived (but I’m not sure…)
Mandy’s socks would make great Christmas stockings. See, you can always find a use for even the weirdest knitting. Rebecca’s shawl is amazing. So beautiful.
My husband and daughter are terrified of spiders. I can’t even carry them outside on a newspaper, thus sparing the life of something that eats other, nastier bugs (I’ve tried). No, they tell me. “Kill it! Just kill it!” Sigh. I do appreciate your predicament, however. When I don’t have my glasses on, simple, everyday things can become something scary. I’m just amazed at the fact that you’re willing to share the story with all of us! Now, THAT takes guts, girl.
I have the same type of treaty as SaraJoan as well — bugs outside OK, bugs inside not OK. In my barn I also permit them to live up in the rafters away from me. If they come down, then they get it. I hope that I am producing rafter-living spiders only at this point in the barn…
As for spiders in the house — I had a big ucky one in my bed, between the sheets, on my side. I have also found earwigs inside my pillowcase. So, so, so incredibly icky. We have to pull apart the bed each night to check for “guests.” Fortunately, DH’s cat Ikabod loves bugs, and quickly eats them up. Good for him. Crunch crunch crunch.
Awww, heck. You coulda come to my house and used my tub, if I’d known you were going to be so close.
Show with your glasses on. I do! (Necessary for shaving and stuff, unless I want to look like that scene from Psycho!)
I swim in ’em, too. Causes no end of embarrassement to my son.
I laughed so hard I almost pissed myself! Terrorized by your own hair! Gotta love it.
Oh, YH! You give me so many LOL moments! And DH actually cracked a rare (for him!) small smile at Mary and the ambulance. Think he identified??!!
Nancy in N MN
You crack me up! We all have our fears I guess… but look at it this way, showering is way better for the environment and you probably saved 15 gallons of water.
Don’t feel too bad about your ‘spider’, I had the same thing happen to me, except mine was bigger, I was at home, and I was taking a bath (In my defence it was 5am, and I’m legaly blind without my glasses) I screamed bloody murder and woke up the whole house to come save me.
On another notable night I feel asleep with my glasses on when I was about 8. I had a nightmare that I was being attacked by a giant spider and managed to thrash and get my glasses twisted on my head so I woke up thinking the spider was real and attacking my face.
(I’m the one who gets all the best stories told about her at family reunions)
Forgive the double-post. I need to read all 7,493 previous thoughts before I join in! To this day (I’m 70) the very first thing I do when entering a (whether inexpensive motel or high-end hotel) room away from home is throw back the shower curtain. Then check under bed (if there’s an “under” there). As a business traveler for years, my best friend was the glassed-door shower – we have an open, walk-in shower with a seat in our new home. But a lovely, almost unused whirlpool tub. You may persuade me to begin using it. But only for relaxing. I’ve never really felt clean unless I have showered! Grew up with a tub, washing my hair in the kitchen sink…….ugh.
Nancy in N MN
You are wrong about the many (boring) pictures of knitting fans at your speech venues. I love them and when I saw you in Oak Brook it was like looking at a Where’s Waldo to find my own head (which I did not). Keep’um coming, all those happy faces.
It’s hilarious that you’re so excited about Halifax. Here we are all excited about you coming (yes, some are so excited they can hardly talk), and then you’re all “halifax, dudes, how exciting”, so then we feel even more excited ourselves. Plus, you’re making Halifax seem like a really cool destination (hey, it is a really cool destination, with lots of famous knitterly connections like Lucy Neatby and the Fleece Artist, for example). So, anyway, see you tonight. I’ll be wearing my t-shirt (go KOL!). We’re meeting at a bar to pick up our t-shirts, so if you happen to see a bunch of women trying to change shirts in public while maintaining some modesty (ha!), that would be us!
(1) Oh that shower incident was funny!
(2) Those big socks are absolutely great. I wonder if they could be turned into mittens or oven gloves or something? And the shawl is awesome.
(3) Erm, I have noticed that your travelling sock never changes colour or even grows in size. What’s going on there please? Are you just taking a reeeeaaaalllllyyyy long time to knit one sock, or are you turning out millions of identical green stripy pairs? Inquiring minds want to know!
Your writing is always such a breath of fresh air! Thank you for your gift of laughter, you are making life much more tolerable! Today is Tuesday. Which is for spinning. My 9 year old just learned to use a drop spindle. Things don’t get much better than that!
My growing up home had a shower in the tub, but never enough water pressure for the shower to work (gravity fed water tank on top of the hill behind the house). I like baths for all the reasons you mentioned.
Great pictures, Lisa’s socks make me think of Christmas. Rebecca’s shawl is gorgeous. I couldn’t even get my dear husband to bring my toothbrush to the hospital, (but he did bring some electronic games. Unlike Five Ferns I don’t think you’re doing anyone a disservice, just because we all learned how to use a map and atlas in school doesn’t mean that we’re all great at geography, or that it’s a snap.
I think you should count yourself blessed that your hair does not resemble, for instance, an armadillo. That would have been far more terrifying. Especially since, I think, armadillos are not so easy to squash as spiders.
Glad you’re ok.
Oy! Laughing so hard it hurts. Really. Sorry, just couldn’t help it, but remember, we are laughing with you dear.
Your hilarious spider story reminds me of the Flanders and Swann song “Driven to it-By the spider in the bath” (http://www.nyanko.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/fas/bestiary_spider.html) although the fact that yours was in a shower would amplify the horror.
Great story!
I’m a regular shower-taker and I do this to myself regularly. and yes, I am always just as terrified and feel just as stupid.
And, I’m sorry, I tried to tell myself it really didn’t matter, that the important thing was that everyone had fun, and that Big People with Big Healthy Senses of Self didn’t need this kind of recognition, but … it actually does matter to me.
*I’M* the one behind the Pantie-Throwing Incident. And here’s the proof:
http://www.ravelry.com/discuss/boston-yarn-party/2605/51-75 – post #54.
~ hb33, who really doesn’t have that big-and-healthy a sense of self after all ~ ;~)
laugh-out-loud good.
OMG!
I would have been slipping and sliding out of that shower and falling on the tile shattering my front teeth if there was a huge spider in there with me.
I would never have admitted publicly that it was a spider of my own making – and once again you rule the Blogiverse.
I sympathize with the damage done by Psycho! My mom was in college when that movie came out and she went to see it with her very best friend. To this day my mom’s very best friend has a clear shower curtain in her bathroom – because of Psycho! I guess if a murderous villian comes in she at least wants to be able to see said villian and perhaps she’ll be able to fight back.
OMG! Spiders in the shower are one of the few things that will make me come unglued. I did wonder, though, if you were in contact with the comic artist here: http://catharsiscomic.com/.
Oh, dear. I sympathize with the shower spider experience, though I’m relatively neutral to spiders, as long as they’re not on my person.
But there IS, I would argue, one thing worse than your experience:
My house has only the beneficial bugs — spiders and house centipedes. I’m ok with spiders, but the centipedes, with their freaky legs and their ability to move REALLY fast, scare the crap out of me. One time, after a shower, I looked at the floor and saw a clump of my reddish-brown hair laying there. Not an uncommon occurence, of course, given my nearly waist-long hair. I bent down to pick it up only to discover, to my horror, that it was NOT hair, but a centipede. GAAAAHHH.
That is the funniest shower scene ever!!!
I refused to ever watch Pyscho…53 and I’ve never seen it (-; But Annie Hall! Annie had that big spider in the bathtub and called Woodie Allen to come over and smush it with a tennis racket, remember? So I was waiting for you to stab it with a knitting needle or something – defensive knitting? But, beware, bathtubs are not spider-safe either.
As a very northern New Yorker, I do know some Canadian geography. For instance, I know to say I plan to “transit” Ontario when driving from home to western Montana. They let me right in, no accounting for it eh? Love that northern Ontario!
Ouch on the tooth! Wishing you a painfree trip to Halifax.
Love Rebecca’s shawl.
Still laughing about the panties!
The thud you might have heard in Halifax was my entire office staff collapsing on the floor, howling with laughter, after reading this.
We have ‘official spider killers’ in our office. No kidding. We get these large brown spiders wandering through the cubicles, and everyone in the vicinity will start screaming out the names of the two men and one woman brave enough to battle the monsters. Then we run the other direction from the spider, and don’t return until we get the all clear signal.
We are such wimps.
Your story about showers reminds me of when my son was little, and I was trying, over time, to coax him into the shower. At some point he gave me one of those “how can you be such an idiot” looks and said, “Mom, why would I want to stand up and have water fall on my head?”
My husband has been known to call me into the shower to kill spiders for him… but, as much hair as I have lost in recent months (don’t know why…just falling out in clumps…fun stuff…) he has yet to have me in to kill my own hair…I’m waiting for the day though…and I promise, Steph–you’ll be the first one I call (e-mail!) to tell!!!
What does the green sock stand for? Is it some kind of lucky charm? Like a shamrock or a lucky rabbits foot(not so lucky for the rabbit)? Or is it the traveling sock? Like the roaming gnome?
I agree that we in the USA aren’t taught much about Canadian geography, or at least we weren’t when I was a kid. It wasn’t until our family moved to the Boston area, and I became a hockey fan, that I learned that Canada had these cool names for their towns, like Moose Jaw and Medicine Hat.
You are lucky you didn’t slip, fall and break something on the bathroom floor lady! Thanks for the chuckle. Good luck with the rest of your trip.
That is too funny. I’ve never heard about someone choosing bathing over showering.
Depending on the showerhead (detachable vs. attached) you could’ve used it to defend yourself against the spider. Sometimes the force of the water will kill the spider and wash him down the drain.
But I’m sure I would’ve done what you did too.
Funny – about a month ago my friend visited and BROKE my shower so I had to take a bath for two weeks. This was terrible as I use baths to relieve my sore back and hip and to relax. I am someone who requires a shower to wake up – even if I have to be somewhere at 5am I will wake up extra early so I can have a shower. Having to only have baths for two weeks was terrible – how do you rinse your hair!? When I was <10 this was all fine, but now, I can’t do it (the shower head attachment thingie that forces the water into the shower head broke).
A co-worker once told me how she took a shower without her glasses (of course) and as she reached for her fruity-something conditioner, she saw a large black something on it. Her husband, the spider-kller, was awake, so she quickly just got out of the shower and summoned him. Before he got there, she put on her glasses and realized that it was (are you ready?) A BAT.
There was a bat. In her shower. On her mango whatever hair care bottle.
Personally, I like bats because they eat mosquitoes and do a way better job at it than spiders, but there’s that FLIGHT factor. If you’re not a complete arachnophobe like me, you can gently scoot a spider onto a paper and carry it to the front door and pretend that it wandered out into the wilderness instead of back through the crack under the door. A bat gets all flappy and agitated if you try that. I mean, yikes.
Thanks (again and again and again) for the laugh! I will be chuckling about the hair spider for a while! hahahahaha!
(PS: I have had a life-long hatred and fear of spiders…so I can totally relate to jumping out of the shower, naked and screaming!)
Hey,
I loved hearing and meeting you in Burlington. And despite what my sister thought (Michele in Maine), I was not surprised by the size of the crowd. I just wanted to give a shout out to Rebecca in CT, with her beautiful shawl. I am from a former co-worker (NEDCC) of her’s and lucky secret santa recipient of a pair of her mittens.
I was sorry to have missed your CT appearance, but glad you enjoyed some shoreline time!
And as someone who has also been frightened by a random cluster of my own hair, thinking it was a monstrous spider on more occasions than I care to admit…I feel your pain. And humiliation. 😉
Stephanie:
I laughed hysterically at your describing how you’re “cautious” about spiders and your experience in the shower. I am exactly the same way! I swear, we could be twins when it comes to how we feel and act around the eight-legged freaks. I hate them and am terrified of any of them larger than the size of an ant. I’m so glad that someone else has had an experience like I’ve had!
I see a remake of Pyscho not with a two legged intrudor but an eight legged one!!! agh…agh…agh…agh…..
Beth
Your hair! In the shower! You make me laugh!
That “spider” in the shower would have made me lose it too!
I have a question for the Harlot… I’ve finally decided to knit myself some socks (yes, I know – resistance is futile) and I want to know how to make them last. How do you wash your handknit socks, and how often? Do you keep them anywhere special or just throw them in the drawer with the cheap cotton floosies?
Hey…don’t feel so bad. The same thing happened to me this morning in the shower (well…almost). I’m blind as a bat too and I thought there was a cockroach in the shower this morning. Now, I’ve never seen a cockroach in my house, but you never know, right? I thought I’d drown it, but it started crawling away from the water. I totally freaked out, went to get my glasses, and lo and behold, it was a piece of plastic from a conditioner sample. Pity the near-sighted.
My husband doesn’t understand why I’m so afraid of something so small. Uh…because they’re gross and creepy-crawly. Duh.
I did that once with a snake. Well, it turned out to be a bit of rope that was loose from a pier, but to me it looked like a water snake. I swam like hell away from it, ran up onto the beach shrieking the whole way, only to turn around and see my friends in the water laughing hysterically at my genius.
…I once had an incident where a Jaycloth was doing a really good impression of a rat. Do not be ashamed as you didn’t even have your glasses on!
OMG!!!!! I need a pair of those panties they threw at you! I just laughed so hard i peed myself.
Being occularly challenged myself, I can understand perfectly how one could mistake the hair for one o’ them 8 legged beasties!
Carolyn
Connecticut is a tiny little state that has sea, mountains, everything but desert! A perfect little sampling of the world. I’m happy you enjoyed it. And the beaches are warmer than the ones on Nova Scotia- having done both in the past few weeks!
Oh, I feel your pain on the hair/spider confusion. My darling husband used to have very long, curly and quite tangly hair, and he would frequently pull loose little clumps while showering. However, my less than darling husband would then ball them up and STICK THEM TO THE SHOWER WALL (presumably to keep them from clogging the drain). Since he also did not wear his glasses in the shower, he would forget about them by the time he had finished his shower, and so he left them- sometimes 5 or 6 little hair ball ‘spiders’- for me to discover when I next went to shower. I was not amused.
I was very relieved when he cut his hair.
there has never been
anything scarrier than spiders when you’re in a shower. spiders should get their own planet
so we don’t have to run into them here.
Laughed until I choked, which made DH ask, “What are you reading?” and of course I had to read it out loud. He’s wondering now who stole my identity, ‘cuz this sounds just like me!
Cheer up – if you’re lucky (like me) your vision will eventually get so bad that when you shower without lenses, you won’t see ANY of the eight-legged invaders in the shower. Then DH will get in and be impressed at your bravery in showering with the big shiny black spider he sees as you’re getting out…
Ok… now that someone famous (and you are famous… there are pics of fans with underpants to prove it) has admitted to being scared by a hair spider… these creatures constantly scare the beejeebers out of me when I’m doing laundry. They frequent my washing machine and I always jump back, let out a yell, and hyperventilate when I see them. It must be a knitter thing. heehee
You poor woman! Thank goodness it was only hair! It’s bad enough to have to deal with spiders fully clothed but vulnerable in the shower like that – EEK!
I have a mistaken spider identity story too… When I was in my teens, my Mom and I were taking furniture and other items out of a barn on our property. While working, I noticed a large fuzzy spider run across the floor and under a piece of furniture. I was so horrified that all I could do was scream, jump, and point. My mom and I were both near tears but for very different reasons…my mother was laughing so hard she couldn’t talk and had to sit down. Eventually she caught her breath and showed me the “spider” – a knob cover in a massive dust bunny! And to add to my embarrassment…our neighbor that lives almost an acre away heard my screams and came running to see if I was ok. =)
Hope your Halifax trip is a story of good, better, best. =)
Your photos of the Ocean and the Sound are stunning. Looks like Sock got a great view!
Hello from Stockholm, I also hit the road.
Speaking about broken molars, I share your pain, it happened to me around two months ago. Fixing it cost me like 30 euros and listening to an hour of curses from my wonderful dentist who said that I broke it in a way that no material will stay there with a guarantee.
REALLY funny.
Laughed out loud.
Also laughed at lady (comments)who chatted to her slipper.
I have spiders too. I feel for you.
Ever considered a knitting visit to South Africa?? You have many fans here! Just LOVE your blog!
Here in Idaho, we have a Hobo spider. They are one of the most poisonious spiders in the world. If they bite you, it eats away your skin.. I am TERRIFIED of them. Even worse, they run towards heat (they are blind) so they actually run TOWARDS YOU. My room in the basement *where the spiders love to live* has only a small bathroom. The tiny shower seems to be the icky spiders favorite hangout. Needless to say, I go upstairs… I don’t care if I have a bathroom emergency. I can’t even knit in my own room during spider season *which just started*. I completely… COMPLETELY understand your terror… I’m just thankful that it was a fake spider
For a second there, I thought Kate’s lighthouse dishcloth was a rendition of a spider… nearly fell off my chair with an attack of the giggles. Glad you’re safe! =)
i really wanted to come and see you in Madison, i live only 45 minutes north of there in the dead center of Connecticut. But, alas, i was out of state.
i’m happy you loved Madison, it has to be my favorite shoreline town. and don’t worry about not knowing Connecticut has a shoreline, i’m convinced that most Americans have no clue Connecticut even exists let alone where it is, so i forgive you for not knowing that Madison is on the water.
it’s great to see your pictures and i was laughing at your reaction to the shower (and your hair).
please come back to Connecticut soon!
~liz