I’m a little behind on this because I missed a couple weeks of Squirrel Report. The call-in question for the Oct. 18 show was the most spectacular pest eradication. Mine isn’t spectacular, but my friends thought it was funny.

About once a month, I have my friends over for a “smoking party.” Basically, I smoke a piece of meat, usually with the assistancey of one of my friends. We smoke the meat, smoke tobacco, and bullshit. These are usually day-long affairs that usually leave me kind of exhausted.

A few months ago, I kicked out my last two friends and then dragged myself into the shower. After a few minutes soaking in the streams of hot water, I turned, looked up, and then screamed like a little girl. Hanging on the ceiling was a spider maybe six to ten inches across. Big. Damn. Spider.

I leapt out of the shower and grabbed my glasses. Seeing clearly didn’t help things. Big. Damn. Spider. Normally, I try to be rational about things. Insects and spiders (especially large ones) will deactivate my rationality and activate “must kill because of terror” parts of my brain.

This is why my first response was to grab a bottle of roach killer. I aimed and sprayed, expecting the BDS to drop into the shower stall, fidget, and die. No, it decided to charge the spray along the ceiling. I continued to hose the BDS (I think I was screaming obscenities, but I can’t remember). The BDS finally got enough spray and dropped into the bathroom trash can. Hurray serendipity!

The BDS was still moving in the trash can. Rationality was still turned off. Must kill was still turned on. In that state of mind, I came up with a brilliant idea. I use scented candles in the bathroom. The candle had been burning for a while. The jar was half-full of melted wax. New weapon!

The BDS finally curled up and died when a half-jar of melted wax hit it like burning oil on storming peasants. Hurray, victory is mine!

The BDS is still at the bottom of the trash can, encased in hardened, scented wax. Even knowing it’s dead, I can’t bring myself to scrape it out. Maybe the BDS had a small victory in death.