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Sent: Saturday, October 04, 2003 9:28 AM
Subject: RE: scorpion on the solar panels
Hi Marcia,
Yep, dem scorpions are in
dem woods etc., and they do get around. Few are life-threatening, but
their sting is quite painful anyhow.
Us Cajuns, we take dem ver'
dim view of dem critters whut sting us and bite us. We usual-ment stomp
'em or whomp 'em on dere headbones.
In Louisiana we grew up with
lots and lots and lots of snakes! Many poisonous. Also had some
taruntulas, including some slick big ones that we called "water
tarantulas".
These latter loved the old
out houses (I never had dem indoor plumbings till I was 23, cept for a
short tour of duty with my father and stepmother, and she jus' beat de
dickens outta me as her favorite occupation).
Anyhow, I vividly recall
waking one night in the little 3-room shotgun house my grandmother and I
lived in, and "having to go", lak rat now! I was about 19.
So on a cold wintry brisky
night, I got the flashlight, went down the little "path out back" to the
outhouse, and seated upon the throne. With the flashlight, one could
see the beady glints of the water tarantulas' eyes as they scurried
around up on the rafters just a couple feet over one's head, and rustled
here and there.
So wunna them critters
decides he needs to move down to the seat, and he just plopped right on
the back of my neck, ker-plop!
Things happened a bit fast
then. I went right through the door with my pajama bottoms still down,
tearing off dem door rat off de hinges and whailing away at that spider
on my neck (they were venemous, but not life-threatening).
Next day, I got some really
lethal spray and went into that outhouse to do battle. Spraying like
mad, I retreated like mad also, as them damn things just leaped all over
me. One of my fond memories is spraying that outhouse like mad while
whaling away at about six or seven of those spiders swarming all over
me. With several trips, I finally got them sprayed and killed off out of
there. To this day, I hate dem spiders lak wit dem compulsions!
A year or so later, the
State Health authorities became concerned about the poor health
conditions of the outhouses of Louisiana. Flies bred in them, critters
like them spiders inhabited them, sometimes snakes hid in them, etc. So
they sent teams around and sprayed all outhouses every six months. That
got rid of those tarantulas permanently -- and the flies and other
assorted menagerie also..
Man, I was glad plumb for to
see dem' 'sprayers come around and spray dem outhouse down good! No
more a' dem tarantulas 'n dem tarantula fightings!
We had a few scorpions in
dem also from time to time, but de sprayings got dem critters alsowise.
Cheers,
Tom
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