Spiders,Snakes & Baby-Eating Dingoes

Meet Sara. Sara is from the UK, has just recently moved to Melbourne and is crashing at my place for a few weeks. Sara hates spiders.

Don’t get me wrong, I hate them just as much as the next arachnophobe. It’s not so much the actual spider, as it is their sneakiness. They go all Osama Bin Laden on your ass. “Oooh, ooh I’m over here!” “Ooops, hehehe, no I’m not, now I’m here” “Betcha can’t find me… hehehe one minute I’m over there, next I’m over here…TO EAT YOUR FACE OFF.” Then next minute before you know it- M.I.A. Waiting to resurface when you least expect it. The similarities are astounding.

So what I can gather with my limited knowledge and 5 minute conversation with Sara, our spiders shit all over UK’s. We have ‘Huntsman” because they will hunt you down and disembowel you (Joking! Sorry, Tourism Australia.) All last summer we had ‘Rat Spider”, an extremely large spider who liked to eat small children and hang out at our front door. Last I heard, Rat Spider went to Hawaii as winter was approaching. I’m hopeful he finds a nice hula-girl, takes up surfing and never returns to our house.

But you know what UK has? Get ready for this. Garden Spiders. Do they weed and fertilise your garden for you at an alarming speed? Do they mulch and plough with such vigour, it’s terrifying? Do they attack the roses in the night with aphids? Please.

Rat Spider

VS

The Ominous British Garden Spider

Alis: Yeah, this spider was as big as my hand. Wait, maybe my head. **Enthusiastically demonstrates largeness of Huntsman**

Sara: **Makes incomprehensible sounds that only dogs can hear**

Alis: Relax. I’m 80% sure they don’t like cold weather so you probably won’t see any whilst your here. Same as snakes.

Sara: Snakes?

Alis: Oh yeah, we have 7 out of the world’s top ten deadliest snakes. Don’t worry I’ve never seen one here. Oh except for that one I saw swimming in the river, did you know snakes could swim? Me neither. Anyway, there’s usually some red-blooded male around that’s more than willing to cut its head off with a shovel.

Sara: Right. Well that’s good to know… Holy shitballs! What the hell was that?!

Alis: Oh that’s just a possum, they’re kind of cute right?

Sara: Aww, it has such cute eyes, and it’s fur looks so cuddly…

Alis: Mmm, word of warning. Don’t try to pat the possum, it will gouge your eyes out. And don’t freak out when you’re sleeping, they’ll bang all over the roof but just ignore it. Another thing. Be careful of koalas. Those fuckers look cute, but they’re feisty little balls of fur. Nearly killed my last dog, true story.

Sara: Killer koalas? *white as a sheet, starts grasping for a paperbag to breath into*

Alis: Oh my, I’m sorry sweetie. I didn’t mean to freak you out. Seriously it’s not that bad. The worst animals are up north anyway. Goanna’s, now they scare the shit out of me. They’re pretty much blind and quite often clamber up human’s legs thinking they are a tree. I do not want a metre long lizard with giant claws attached to me, no siree.

Sara: What? Are these blind lizards here? *glances behind her in terror*

Alis: Nah, up in Northern QLD. We went on a roadtrip up there, and I had to carry a frypan every time I went to pee in the bushes. No-one likes a goanna-bitten, you-know-what.

Sara: Well now, I can see your concerns. *mentally and unwillingly envisioning a goanna-bitten you-know-what* How was your roadtrip by the way? No accidents in the Wicked Van?

Alis: It was amazing. No accidents that I can recall… Oh wait. There was one incident with a large kangaroo. God I hate those fuckers. They wait on the side of the road, and then POW! 2 metres high of pure muscle and fur jumps out in front of your car. If you hit one of those puppies, your cars pretty much written off. There’s an urban legend that they kick through your windscreen and box the hell out of you. Evil. Fuckers.

Sara: I quite liked the TV show Skippy the Kangaroo. Until now.

Alis: Doesn’t UK have any scary creatures?

Sara: Not really. Garden spiders freak me out. And foxes and badgers. But that’s about it.

Alis: Ooooh, like Wind in the Willows? I bloody loved that book.

Sara: Errr, yeh kinda.

Alis: Did you know a Dingo once stole a baby here?

Wanted: Raconteur/Bon Vivant

When the idea arose to get another housemate, questions were flying around my head. Would we still be able to run around the house in our underwear? Would he be accommodating to our love of mid-afternoon cocktails? Sure, it would be nice to have another housie that we could drink copious amounts of beer with but where would we play ‘Drunk Ball’ ? Our Gladiators-inspired game involving nothing but pitch-blackness and a large exercise ball missiling around the spare room, ruthlessly breaking noses and light fittings. This rates pretty highly on our ‘Brilliant Alcohol Inspired Ideas’ list. Nonetheless, it was decided to recruit a new housie and we placed an ad first thing the next morning.

“Housemate required for large 3 Bedroom House. 2 professional females wanting one human male that likes to drink beer and have BBQ’s. Must be able to kill spiders/snakes/dragons, as previously stated we want a male not a girl. Must have full-time work, students we like you but we don’t want to live with you.Also nothing against kids, but we don’t want them in our house as they are loud and whiny. Extreme sports skills in the areas of dodgeball, twister and squash will be regarded highly, but not essential. Must appreciate but most definitely not overuse the word ‘radical’. If this sounds like you, contact us asap. ”

Let the games begin! People actually wanted to pay cash to live in our humble abode. The replies were coming in fast and steady however as I waded through them, I noticed a disconcerting pattern.

I think I would be a perfect match however I am currently a student and therefore would not be able to pay the amount mentioned. Would you consider cooking/cleaning as a form of payment?

House sounds great however I do have a Siamese cat named ZuZu and a snake called Roy. They can stay in my room the whole time though so shouldn’t be an issue.

I would love to be considered for your room, however I should tell you that I am part of a jazz band and we would require the house to rehearse in two nights a week.

I think your house sounds wonderful, please consider my application. However I do have 3 children who might stay over if my bitch ex-wife decides to let me see them again. Last time I saw them they were pretty well-behaved but who knows since that whore has probably brainwashed them and influenced them with her neurotic bitch traits. Call me!

Then Phil sent a nice email through, complete with perfect grammar and punctuation (10 points right there). After a few emails back and forth, I was happy to confirm that there were no strange pets, estranged children and he had a fulltime job. Plus he liked to write and act in his spare time, perfect! We set up a meet and greet and eagerly anticipated meeting our new housemate, donned Phil the Man.

I’ll cut to the chase – Phil the Man was strange. AND he was scared of spiders, what a douche. Phil had failed to specify that his full-time gig was his own coaching and mentoring business for actors called “Ultimate 9 because no-one is a perfect ten“. If we’d known this, perhaps we would have been prepared for the numerous hackneyed phrases Phil felt compelled to bestow upon us. His parting words – “We’re all in this game called life together girls, lovely to meet you”. This was the “final nail in the coffin” for Phil.

Hmm, we’d have to improve our telephone/email scanning skills and weed out the freaks more thoroughly. This meant not offering an interview to the guy who sounded like he was in a time machine when he called. “Uh I can’t really hear you, are you on an airplane runway?” “Oh sorry, I have a lot of electronic equipment in my room, it sometimes interferes with the phone signal”. Well mister, you can monitor alien movements in someone else’s house. Or ‘Rico’ who wasn’t prepared to leave his shitty old ute out on the street. We sent a nice email kindly letting him know that we perhaps it wouldn’t work out, but thanks for contacting us. He replied and coyly asked if I would like to meet him for a coffee. You have to give the guy points for trying, but tell me Rico – if I couldn’t stand the thought of living with you, what would make you think I would want to date you?

After 2 long months of wading through the hoards of homeless freaks and weirdos, we found Dan the Man (far better sounding than Phil the Man). Dan kills spiders, listens to good music, drinks beer. I’m yet to ask him if he enjoys Dodgeball but may throw a ball at his head tonight and see how he reacts.

‘ Home is where the heart is ‘ Phil – Ultimate 9 Director and Ultimate-wanker.