Fuck. Spiders.

This post will not include any spider pictures as there is no way I'll ever actually go into Google, type in "spider" and then actually browse through a gallery of pictures to choose the best looking ones for this blog...

I don't like spiders.

I don't like 'em, because I'm shit scared of them.

I don't like 'em, because according to social construct (and to myself) I'm too old to be jumping away like a startled amphetamine driven rabbit at the sight of a bug that, albeit disgusting, cannot cause me any harm.

I don't like 'em, because those 8 legged motherfuckers are everywhere.

I don't like 'em, because I'm afraid...

This post can go many ways from here. It can dig deep into the modern human's psychological mind stuff - why do we not like things were afraid of? Why are we afraid of creepy crawlies? Are the things we do not like about ourselves, something we fear because of the way society is built? But fuck that existential shit, this post is about how fucking horrible spiders are.

That shit has 8 legs that are either as thin as my patience for homophobes or as thick as homophobes. For those unfamiliar with my views on homophobes - a different analogy. Them legs either creepy as shit cuz the thing is kinda like a tall skinny dude, but unmistakeably evil, or them legs are like of a stereotypical Russian in the eyes of western society - big, dangerous, hairy. Each one of those legs moves in a beautiful flowing motion, perfectly synchronized with the other 7, and that movement looks creepy as shit. And it's fast, but it is no way faster than the speed of shit being deposited into my pants upon visual contact.

Then there's the body. It can be so tiny that fucker looks like its just legs converging into a single point. Or... it can be as big as a motherfucking puppy. That thing sometimes has different parts, each creepier than the other. It can have more body hair than me (and trust me I have enough body hair for this analogy to make sense). It can have like a gazillion hell eyes on its front that just peer into your soul and you know if you could fucking see into that things soul (if it had a bloody soul) you'd see only one thing:

You'd see snickering. It'd mock you. It'd be like "Hello cunt. I am completely harmless, I can cause zero damage via physical force to you, but you know what... you still my bitch." And you are! You know it! If you're scared of spiders like I am, and I know many who are, you can be the toughest craziest motherfucker out there and you still gonna be this spider's bitch at least for a second before you kill it with your shoe or a sledgehammer (whichever you have at hand)...

Okay, that's all nice, but Ivo why are you telling us all this? Because Scotland is awesome, I have only seen like 5 spiders in total for a month, with one little exception when I literally saw the stuff of nightmares and now I'll tell you about it.

On my way to work one day I saw a big ass tree that looked very pretty. It was on the left side of the only road that leads through a forest to the house I work at. The light was shining through the branches and the leaves, slightly distorted bythe white fruit on the branches. And then I close in to take a  picture, cuz that tree was pretty, when I saw there was no such thing as white fruit on that tree. That was spider webs... Spider webs that formed big ass pouches... Pouches that were all around them tree branches... Pouches that were filled with thousands of spiders probably...

I walked away scared as shit. I said fuck about a million times on my way to the house. I looked around constantly like paranoid (because I was acting paranoid).

One tree, which I ran away from ain't that bad. I mean yeah it's nightmarish, but it ain't THAT bad... Only it wasn't one tree...

The next day I saw 4 more, for a total of 5 trees... And then the next day I saw maybe 10 trees just like that one varying in sizes and shit, but this time I had noticed that some of the old trees no longer had the pouches... Those fuckers must've popped open as there was no visible signs of someone smart coming in with a flame-thrower to clear them up.

And then one day, as I walked on that forest road, surrounded by spider infested trees I saw it. One of the trees still had it's pouches, only not all of them were white... The fuckers were starting to come out. There were so many. If they were bigger it would literally be just like in some of my nightmares. There were black patches of them fuckers on that tree and I knew I'm gonna die. I wasn't really gonna die, but I knew I was...

I ran full speed away from that.

Fuck. Spiders.

Pete The Spider

The fire cracks quieter and quieter as the piece of wood inside burns out. When it's just embers I go to the basket with the pinecone in front of it and pick up a new one. Open the glass door to the fireplace and position the new log on top of the burning embers. Close the door, slide the thing that opens up the air vents and make sure the wood catches fire. When it does, I slide the air vents back and get my ass back on the couch. 30 minutes left.

In 30 minutes I have to slowly make my way to the room in which Ben rests and check if he's asleep. If he's sleeping peacefully, I get my ass back on the couch for another hour, if not I turn him over from his left side to his back so he's comfortable.

Ben has a rare muscle degenerative disease and he's stuck to a wheelchair and basically can't move by himself properly. He needs someone to care for him and 2 nights a week that's my job.

I arrive at 20:00, make his bed, do whatever Ben needs done in the next 2 hours, like make him a cup of tea, help him with his weather station, or just chill and talk. Then around 22:00 I assist him with his medication, brush his teeth, wash his face and hands, prepare whatever clothes he wants for the day after, help him with the toilet and get him to bed.

Everything has to be done in a specific way. Just like with the fire there's a special procedure. A specific way to put the electric toothbrush in his hand and help him use it. A specific way to wash his hands. A specific way to prepare the water with which he drinks his pills. A specific way for... Everything.

And after he's asleep it's just me and Pete. Pete is a spider.

3 Hours of Night, 21 Hours of Morning

Recently I moved to Aberdeen, Scotland. Moving was shit I might write about it in the future if requested, but right now I refuse to. And now the weather.

I love Scotland. I love the weather. It's nice and cold. There's clouds all the time. No fucking direct sunlight to burn my retina. No heat waves to melt my being. It's cool (pun intended). However, during the summer there is no night. I don't mean like the North Pole, where the sun doesn't set for 6 months, I mean it tries to set, but it fails. It's a shitty excuse for a night.

I go home at 00:30 and it's still light outside. Yeah the sun technically speaking sets a bit after 22:00 but in reality it's still fucking light outside. Then the sun technically speaking rises at 04:00 so that should theoretically give you 6 hours of night, which is little, but it can still be regarded as night. Yeah... no.

It goes dark at 1 fucking AM. It goes light at 3 fucking AM. 2 hours is the shittiest excuse for night. That's not real night. That's like me playing basketball. I'm not really playing basketball, I'm throwing a ball, hoping it's gonna go through the circle thingy, making a fool of myself on purpose so that I hide the shame of my basketball related athletic incompetency...

"But sunshine is awesome!" "I love sunny Summers, why are you complaining?!" Okay lets say that I share your masochistic enjoyment of constant sunlight, and I was born with retina that didn't burn after looking at a light bulb for longer than 2 seconds. This is still Scotland bitch. There is no sunlight. There's clouds. It rains everyday. And I do mean everyday. When it's sunny (once every two weeks get a real proper sunny day) the locals get startled and confused. They call sick at work, so they may enjoy the day, hopefully go in their backyards and have a BBQ or something.

My point is, the day here, because of the constant clouds and shit, feels like morning. You know what I mean, maybe you're not certain, but trust me you know it. That colour the sky has, that feeling in the air right after sunrise. Kinda chilly, but not really. Kinda sunny, but sun is too low to feel proper. Yeah that feeling... All day long, aside from the 13:00 to 15:00 time period (if you're lucky).

I forgot where I was going with this when I started the post, it's just so... wrong...

If you're the type of person who gets up when it feels like it's morning outside you're fucked.
If you're the type of person who gets up when it feels like it's no longer morning outside you're fucked.
If you're the type... you get where I'm going with this.

Good thing is now I get to drink coffee all day long and it's somehow excused?

I really do like Scotland so far. It's awesome. Cheers.