I don't care much for most spiders, but I love tarantulas. I used to live and work in the desert and right on their migration route. Tens of thousands of them on the march! Very docile giants.
October is THE month to see those critters out here in CA. Though Mt. Diablo over in the East SF Bay Area is said to be prime viewing, I haven't been up there for it. But I did see a migration down in Carrizo Plain, a.k.a. California's Serengeti. Amazing.
When we moved to the mountains east of Albuquerque in 1983, it was apparently Tarantula Orgy season! They were strolling all over Rt 66 like it was Mardi Gras and it was a real struggle to avoid running them over. We kids promptly adopted some to keep in a terrarium for a while. For clarity, we named them all Bob. We found this hilarious; the tarantulas did not comment. Sorry if we misgendered you guys! 😂
My own spider story: yesterday I pulled out a book from the bottom of one of my bookcases, and what did I find clinging to the page edges but a lil' house spider and two egg cases, one that looked like it was full of lil' babby House spiders! I tried to get her to vacate, but no way - she was staying with her offspring. So of course I sighed, apologized to her, and carefully put the book back on the shelf. 🥹
I once opened the lid of my Weber grill for the first time of the season in early Spring only to find a mouse nest with mom and babies. Closed the lid and didn’t grill until they had vacated the premises.
"Trump and his advisers are debating whether to call off plans to livestream the firing squad execution of the Fort Hood shooter, with Trump having remarked privately that he did not initially know that Nidal Hasan was paralyzed from the waist down, two sources familiar with the discussions told CNN. That he now uses a wheelchair made showing the execution publicly less palatable to the president. One of the sources familiar with the discussions pointed to Trump’s deep understanding of imagery as a key reason why he may decide to ditch plans for the livestream."
A bit late, perhaps, but--morning, all. I'm awake and upright in my wheelchair, waiting on the home health nurse and then my grocery order a bit later. Suddenly I really want some ice-cold water, preferably flavored. (I ordered some acai-grape water, plus a bunch of plain drinking water I can add Gatorade powder to.) I also ordered a pack of English muffins and a tub of strawberry cream cheese. And apple sauce. Because I'm apparently still a child...?
There's a wing place across the street next to a decent little coffee shop. I looked into it because I was bored, and now all I want is to go over there and get some fries and a drink. At some point, I shall, when I can afford it.
As the home health nurse is supposed to be here between 11 and noon, I have taken the recommended pain pill in preparation for her torturing my stump with the wound vac change. At least I'll be euphoric in a little while.
My appetite continues to improve, I think. I ate two of those little tubs of yogurt for breakfast, and I had a late-night snack of a small bowl of Froot Loops around 1am. That's quite a bit of good news, I'd say.
Trump called two men onto the stage at a campaign rally in Wasilla, Alaska, on Tuesday night – and pardoned them. White House aide Natalie Harp brought the pardons for Zachary Czubak and Patrick Fleming on stage for Trump to sign.
Czubak and Fleming pleaded guilty in 2022 to violating the Clean Air Act through their car repair shop, where, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the trio tampered with federally mandated monitoring devices on private and commercial diesel vehicles and removed required air pollution control equipment on at least 37 vehicles.
“When you give somebody a pardon, they say that means – and I don’t know how this works and why it’s an expression, but it’s well-used – that means you’re as clean as a newborn baby’s ass. I never understood that. Why is that so clean?” Trump said.
"An AI-generated video released Tuesday by the campaign of GOP Sen. Marsha Blackburn, who is running for governor of Tennessee depicts Blackburn as Kendrick Lamar during his 2025 Super Bowl halftime performance of “Not Like Us,” with Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.), Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), state Sen. Brent Taylor and Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs as backup dancers.
One commenter described it as an “AI cringe fest.”"
I had a roommate in university had a few tarantulas. The Mexican rose grey was pretty calm; I let it walk on me once all in the name of science.
He had others that were less so and I did not. Later I heard through a mutual friend also briefly lived with him one of them escaped the terrarium and was at large in the apartment a while… It later turned up dead to mixed reactions.
(Yeah we had parted ways by then and not long after he got into spiders, but this was really due other changes in our respective lives if memory serves.)
PotatoHead Steven Cheung on Xitter: "A tremendous start for the new White House @PressSec! She commanded the room and effectively reminded the American people of all the great work President Trump and his Administration has done thus far."
White House Rapid Response: "Today, Katie Zacharia delivered a commanding inaugural press briefing as the 37th White House Press Secretary. The briefing, which generated wall-to-wall coverage, served as a strong introduction to her tenure and highlighted the Trump Administration’s record of delivering historic successes for the American people."
A red bird has been pecking at my window for days. Traditional folklore says that seeing a red bird usually symbolizes a spiritual visit from a departed loved one, a sign of hope, or a reminder of love and vitality.
"In response to the billionaire tax, Newsom this summer announced a proposal to impose a national tax on the wealthy, including a minimum tax rate on anyone with a net worth of more than $100 million. He also wants to undo corporate tax cuts that President Donald Trump and Congress approved in 2017, boost inheritance taxes and close loopholes the wealthy use to borrow from unrealized capital gains without paying income taxes."
Ta, Rebecca. Ta, Martini. I cut up the pineapple when I got out of bed, and darling Meccalopolis served us flowery white tea and put together our luscious fruit bowls. The sunlight is pouring in through the high window, making my beautiful husband's hair look like gold and silver. Good day, beloved Wonketteers. We love and appreciate you all and we bless us all with love, health, peace, and grace.
Please, please stay safe. Wear a mask or two, wash your hands, sanitize when you cannot wash and let the sanitizer dry completely, stop touching your face, take Vitamin D, get a booster shot six months after your last, catch up on any other vaccines you need, and get any kids in your family vaccinated as well, and stay the fuck away from us and anyone with whom you do not share a roof. Do this because you love yourself, and because we love you, too. Do this in memory of 27 Club member Treg, Holly's heroic pilot friend Tony, Dolly Parton, who put up a million dollars of her own money to make the Moderna vaccine possible, and nearly eight million dead worldwide, possibly including Gav, who had long COVID. Do this to honor the nurses and other frontline medical personnel (we love you, medicos of Wonkette, from student to active to retired), especially ICU Hera Mrs Land Shark RN. Stay safe. When we vote, we WIN!!
There is an interactive display where a visitor answers a series of Diva questions and a software doo-hickey lets the visitor know what Diva the visitor most resembles. (Possible answers include Dolly and Cher and Taylor etc etc etc.)
So I took the quiz and I was told that I was "A Missy". I found out that 'a Missy' means Missy Elliot.
I know this will betray my startling lack of cultural cachet but I have to ask the people here a question: Am I the right kind of Diva for this mommy blog?
She’s too pretty to be tossed about. It’s your hed gif giant spider: https://martiniambassador.substack.com/p/webby-and-goliath
And your meme chat: https://open.substack.com/chat/posts/8b34e79c-d6ae-40a8-a986-46f3dbd64f86?r=angu9&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=share
Who's a good girl? Who's the best girl?
Goodness, I can't deal with anything that has that many legs (unless it's a Norse horse). I have great respect for Grandmother Spider, but.... yikes.
Spiders do not get the credit they deserve as pest control specialists.
They usually freeze or hide once a human enters the room and go on about their business once the human exits.
(And so would we all do if a spider the size of the empire state building suddenly walked in while we were trying to eat our dinner.)
So don't squash them if you see them. Just shoo them into hiding.
"I promise not to kill you": https://youtu.be/zmQYICF7ExU?si=Gx9c95S4jnOjWpnn
(He is our hero!)
I don't care much for most spiders, but I love tarantulas. I used to live and work in the desert and right on their migration route. Tens of thousands of them on the march! Very docile giants.
October is THE month to see those critters out here in CA. Though Mt. Diablo over in the East SF Bay Area is said to be prime viewing, I haven't been up there for it. But I did see a migration down in Carrizo Plain, a.k.a. California's Serengeti. Amazing.
Can the tarantula stay in its tab, and I’ll stay in mine? Please?
She doesn’t look like a blondi
Theraphosa blondii, the infamous urticating hair kicker.
I’m sorry, this is the rare time I won’t click through and learn about tarantulas. Nope!
:(
Don't throw tarantulas--they're terrestrial spiders and they can be injured or killed if they fall.
Tell that to the crazy ex-candidate for senate!
Call Hagrid!!!
When we moved to the mountains east of Albuquerque in 1983, it was apparently Tarantula Orgy season! They were strolling all over Rt 66 like it was Mardi Gras and it was a real struggle to avoid running them over. We kids promptly adopted some to keep in a terrarium for a while. For clarity, we named them all Bob. We found this hilarious; the tarantulas did not comment. Sorry if we misgendered you guys! 😂
My favourite video about tarantula mating season: https://youtu.be/9V-ObOY5Bs8?si=8VNGMorMYnmI8Jam
Thank you for that! 😂 I feel somewhat better. At least we saved them from the tarantula wasps. Now Those are scary!
The very worst insect bite I've ever gotten was by one of them. Way worse than a scorpion or black widow, which I've also been bitten/stung by.
There was an old woman who swallowed a spider that wriggled and jiggled and tickled inside her
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly I don't know why she swallowed a fly
perhaps she'll die.
A mystery!
My own spider story: yesterday I pulled out a book from the bottom of one of my bookcases, and what did I find clinging to the page edges but a lil' house spider and two egg cases, one that looked like it was full of lil' babby House spiders! I tried to get her to vacate, but no way - she was staying with her offspring. So of course I sighed, apologized to her, and carefully put the book back on the shelf. 🥹
I once opened the lid of my Weber grill for the first time of the season in early Spring only to find a mouse nest with mom and babies. Closed the lid and didn’t grill until they had vacated the premises.
Well, what else are you going to do?
I would do the same and give her a name.
You are my kind of kind.
Little Shelob.
No. Just no.
!!!
https://simplyecologist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/11_20230604_101125_0010.png
Perfect. A spider that can fly after me. That pretty much covers biology for me for October.
I used to pull this one out for Shan when spiders were on topic.
Ha! I guessed! For shame. :D
😂
I always wanted to get one but my exhubsand wouldn't let me. I was going to name it Betty after his mother.
And this is your LESS hostile username? 🤣
You shoulda seen the first one. Heh.
It’s sad that in our current political environment this sentence fragment actually is grammatically and descriptively correct
“Sometime last week I said some dumb Fuck Joe Biden 24-year-old sexxxbomb…”
"This is why you never fuck with Maria Simonetti!" is going RIGHT into my personal lexicon.
"Trump and his advisers are debating whether to call off plans to livestream the firing squad execution of the Fort Hood shooter, with Trump having remarked privately that he did not initially know that Nidal Hasan was paralyzed from the waist down, two sources familiar with the discussions told CNN. That he now uses a wheelchair made showing the execution publicly less palatable to the president. One of the sources familiar with the discussions pointed to Trump’s deep understanding of imagery as a key reason why he may decide to ditch plans for the livestream."
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/10/13/politics/trump-fort-hood-shooter-livestream-execution
A bit late, perhaps, but--morning, all. I'm awake and upright in my wheelchair, waiting on the home health nurse and then my grocery order a bit later. Suddenly I really want some ice-cold water, preferably flavored. (I ordered some acai-grape water, plus a bunch of plain drinking water I can add Gatorade powder to.) I also ordered a pack of English muffins and a tub of strawberry cream cheese. And apple sauce. Because I'm apparently still a child...?
There's a wing place across the street next to a decent little coffee shop. I looked into it because I was bored, and now all I want is to go over there and get some fries and a drink. At some point, I shall, when I can afford it.
As the home health nurse is supposed to be here between 11 and noon, I have taken the recommended pain pill in preparation for her torturing my stump with the wound vac change. At least I'll be euphoric in a little while.
My appetite continues to improve, I think. I ate two of those little tubs of yogurt for breakfast, and I had a late-night snack of a small bowl of Froot Loops around 1am. That's quite a bit of good news, I'd say.
Trump called two men onto the stage at a campaign rally in Wasilla, Alaska, on Tuesday night – and pardoned them. White House aide Natalie Harp brought the pardons for Zachary Czubak and Patrick Fleming on stage for Trump to sign.
Czubak and Fleming pleaded guilty in 2022 to violating the Clean Air Act through their car repair shop, where, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the trio tampered with federally mandated monitoring devices on private and commercial diesel vehicles and removed required air pollution control equipment on at least 37 vehicles.
“When you give somebody a pardon, they say that means – and I don’t know how this works and why it’s an expression, but it’s well-used – that means you’re as clean as a newborn baby’s ass. I never understood that. Why is that so clean?” Trump said.
He is really rabbiting on about ass a lot lately.
Jesse Watters Hijacks Fox News Discussion To Talk ... 'About Guys' Asses'
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/jesse-watters-trump-husted-ass-comment_n_6aceb5efe4b08a0fe8545fbe?origin=home-whats-happening-unit
"An AI-generated video released Tuesday by the campaign of GOP Sen. Marsha Blackburn, who is running for governor of Tennessee depicts Blackburn as Kendrick Lamar during his 2025 Super Bowl halftime performance of “Not Like Us,” with Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.), Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), state Sen. Brent Taylor and Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs as backup dancers.
One commenter described it as an “AI cringe fest.”"
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/marsha-blackburn-ai-kendrick-lamar_n_6acf1c05e4b06494347986d3?origin=home-latest-news-unit
https://x.com/VoteMarsha/status/2110116845688590460
I had a roommate in university had a few tarantulas. The Mexican rose grey was pretty calm; I let it walk on me once all in the name of science.
He had others that were less so and I did not. Later I heard through a mutual friend also briefly lived with him one of them escaped the terrarium and was at large in the apartment a while… It later turned up dead to mixed reactions.
(Yeah we had parted ways by then and not long after he got into spiders, but this was really due other changes in our respective lives if memory serves.)
What happened to the spider?
PotatoHead Steven Cheung on Xitter: "A tremendous start for the new White House @PressSec! She commanded the room and effectively reminded the American people of all the great work President Trump and his Administration has done thus far."
White House Rapid Response: "Today, Katie Zacharia delivered a commanding inaugural press briefing as the 37th White House Press Secretary. The briefing, which generated wall-to-wall coverage, served as a strong introduction to her tenure and highlighted the Trump Administration’s record of delivering historic successes for the American people."
https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2026/10/katie-zacharia-delivers-powerful-inaugural-briefing-as-37th-white-house-press-secretary/
I mistakenly read "successes" as "excuses."
zacharia: "and i look forward to working with you." stops.
notes indicate: *look up and smile*
zacharia: looks up and smiles.
A red bird has been pecking at my window for days. Traditional folklore says that seeing a red bird usually symbolizes a spiritual visit from a departed loved one, a sign of hope, or a reminder of love and vitality.
I really hope that's true.
"In response to the billionaire tax, Newsom this summer announced a proposal to impose a national tax on the wealthy, including a minimum tax rate on anyone with a net worth of more than $100 million. He also wants to undo corporate tax cuts that President Donald Trump and Congress approved in 2017, boost inheritance taxes and close loopholes the wealthy use to borrow from unrealized capital gains without paying income taxes."
https://calmatters.org/politics/2026/10/newsom-tax-propositions-november-election/
Ta, Rebecca. Ta, Martini. I cut up the pineapple when I got out of bed, and darling Meccalopolis served us flowery white tea and put together our luscious fruit bowls. The sunlight is pouring in through the high window, making my beautiful husband's hair look like gold and silver. Good day, beloved Wonketteers. We love and appreciate you all and we bless us all with love, health, peace, and grace.
Please, please stay safe. Wear a mask or two, wash your hands, sanitize when you cannot wash and let the sanitizer dry completely, stop touching your face, take Vitamin D, get a booster shot six months after your last, catch up on any other vaccines you need, and get any kids in your family vaccinated as well, and stay the fuck away from us and anyone with whom you do not share a roof. Do this because you love yourself, and because we love you, too. Do this in memory of 27 Club member Treg, Holly's heroic pilot friend Tony, Dolly Parton, who put up a million dollars of her own money to make the Moderna vaccine possible, and nearly eight million dead worldwide, possibly including Gav, who had long COVID. Do this to honor the nurses and other frontline medical personnel (we love you, medicos of Wonkette, from student to active to retired), especially ICU Hera Mrs Land Shark RN. Stay safe. When we vote, we WIN!!
Slava Ukraini 🌻🇺🇦💙💛
I love you, darling. Good morning, Wonks!
Information please....
Denver art Museum opened a show called DIVA. It's all about Divas. https://www.denverartmuseum.org/en/exhibitions/diva
There is an interactive display where a visitor answers a series of Diva questions and a software doo-hickey lets the visitor know what Diva the visitor most resembles. (Possible answers include Dolly and Cher and Taylor etc etc etc.)
So I took the quiz and I was told that I was "A Missy". I found out that 'a Missy' means Missy Elliot.
I know this will betray my startling lack of cultural cachet but I have to ask the people here a question: Am I the right kind of Diva for this mommy blog?
Is Divine one of the possible matches?
Oh yes. And Ru Paul.
Of course, of course.
"Law? I thought you said slaw. I shared my recipe in China. It has raisins. "