Death of an Innocent

Today I killed an innocent spider. I feel guilty because I like spiders; they eat flies and I don’t like flies. This is naturally wrong and selfish of me to slaughter species depending on my personal likes and dislikes, but that’s just the way I am.

But I have been seduced by the media hysteria about white-tailed spiders and their venomous bites. So when I saw this thing with its white spots I was alarmed and I sprayed it with the ‘Raid Multipurpose Fastkill’. It was a sprightly little blighter and I had to chase it around the kitchen waving my aerosol can screaming, ‘Die, die, die!’

Eventually it rolled over and curled each of its eight legs (the front four of which are red) around its delicate body to protect itself, but I was ruthless with my pesticide. I was so non-green, I was practically Agent Orange!

I then looked up images of spiders on the internet to justify my actions. A while later I was crawling with guilt (and psychosomatic itches) as I realised that ‘my’ spider looked nothing like the ones on the pages before me.

So in memorandum – here is a photo of the wee beastie I cruelly cut down in the prime of its life. Note the lack of resemblance to the much-maligned white-tail (listed on an Australian catalogue of spiders as 'low risk'). For shame.