WORST Spider experience EVER

I went to lunch a few weeks back with Ron & Heidi. We rode in Ron’s van, and I sat in the front passenger seat. We pulled out of the office parking lot, and were about 1 block away from the office when I saw it. It came crawling up out of the defroster and was moving across the dash. All of a sudden, there was lots of blood-curdling screaming (which I later found out was all me). Before Ron could get the van pulled over, I had ripped off my seatbelt, opened the door, and was diving out of the van. Note to self: next time, wait for the van to come to a complete stop. As I stood on the side of the road, still jumping and flipping out, Ron & Heidi went to work trying to kill the spider. He kept returning to the defroster, peeking out, going back in, and so forth. Finally, it was determined that he had gone back in and was not coming back out – I have no idea how this was determined, I never saw any written agreements exchanged. We climbed back into the van, me in the back seat this time, and Heidi in the front seat. We tried turning the defroster on high at both temperature extremes, but no luck flushing him out. I called Ed at the office to make sure he was “on-deck” to come pick me up if the spider reappeared. By the middle of my meal, my heart beat had returned to normal, and I had mostly forgotten about the spider. That is, until we left. As we walked back out to the van, my heart starting pounding so fast that I could hear it in my head. Once Ron opened the van, I gave him ample time to do a “spidey-check”. He suddenly started jamming a business card down in the dash as spidey had returned. Again, no luck killing the *&^%er. Somehow, and I’m not sure how, I managed to get back in the van and head back to the office. On the way back, we discussed all of our options. One of them being, we would all exit the van and then somehow cause it to plow into the side of the building, thus causing the corporate fleet people to replace Ron’s van. This seemed like the best option to me. Ron, however, seemed to think the better option would be for me to just not ride in his van until he had killed the spider. This might also be a good place in the story to point out that while I maintain the Spider was the size of a penny, Ron felt it was much smaller.

A few days go by, and Ron is in the office again and stops by my desk. He mentions that “Herbie” had reappeared. The fact that he had named the spider should have been my first clue that he was still alive. Ron said that while he was driving, Herbie came crawling up out of the defroster once again, and sauntered across the dash. He commenced to playing “wack a mole” on his dash board trying to kill Herbie. Mind you, Ron was DRIVING when this occurred. Again, Herbie survived.

Now, I know some of you might be thinking – wow, I’m sure she is not even remotely entertaining ever riding in this van again. And you are mostly right. But it is what I learned today that made me absolutely certain, 100%, I will never ride in that van again. Today, Ron informed me that while he & his wife, Clara, and their daughters, were visiting their son in Chicago over the weekend, they encountered Herbie’s Mom. Herbie’s Mom was crawling along the back of Ron’s front seat while he was driving, and Clara reached up and brushed her into the floor. If you are wondering if she killed Herbie’s Mom, no, she did not. I stared at Ron in disbelief that she had not taken the perfect opportunity to kill the (*&^er. I politely informed Ron that if we lunch together again, I will be driving.