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[X-ray]

There is a good-sized spider here in my room. I noticed it out of the corner of my eye crawling up the wall behind the TV. At full stretch its legs span the mouth of a coffee mug and it is a slightly furry dark brown.

Now here is the problem: this being London, I am inclined to give this dude a break as he is not likely to be poisonous (he might like to nip though). Also, he has gone back down behind some units and although I can see him, I can't get at him for the purposes of evicting him. I could probably kill him, but I wouldn't feel good about it.
But then again, I don't want to wake up to the sensation of spider legs on my face tonight...
What to do?

[blobrana]

Hum,
you got mosquito netting handy to put around your bed?

Just in case it’s a funnel web or something nasty imported with a box of bananas...

[Cymric]

Sounds like a house spider (Tegenaria gigantea): I remember seeing a few in my old house in the middle of the province in the Netherlands. They are indeed quite big and will scare the living daylights out of many people. Google Images has quite a few nice pictures. They have fangs, but are not poisonous to humans. However, be careful if you live in the northwest of the US: there T. agrestis, the hobo spider, is much more common, and their bites are much more unpleasant, sometimes even leading to necrosis :-o!

I wouldn't worry about spider legs on your face, although there is a statistic which says that on average, people eat three spiders a year in their sleep because the hapless arachnids chose to crawl over a pillow, or came too close to people's faces while dangling from a silk strand.

Let's just say you'll know what is going on if you wake to faint tickling sensations on your face :-D .

[X-ray]

Aaaaaaaarrgghh!!

You two have NOT made me feel cool about this dude being here, and to make things worse, I can't find him anymore!!!!
I don't know where he is...
...and thanks to Blobzie's imported spider theory I reckon I am going to have no sleep tonight.
Right, I gotta get this spider outta here, now.

[adz]

During the Summer months, you could stand in my front yard and easily count around 10 or so similar spiders (Huntsman) climbing up my outside walls. Thens there's the Red Backs that live in my compost bins and the White Tails that frequent my living areas. To top things off, we have Tiger snakes living by the creek that flows past the back of my place. How does that make you feel X-ray?

[bloodline]

X-ray wrote:
Aaaaaaaarrgghh!!

You two have NOT made me feel cool about this dude being here, and to make things worse, I can't find him anymore!!!!
I don't know where he is...
...and thanks to Blobzie's imported spider theory I reckon I am going to have no sleep tonight.
Right, I gotta get this spider outta here, now.

Ignore it. fire up your Amiga and let the Spider do it's job of eating flies... I'm terrorfied of flies, I love spiders for the sole reason that they eat flies!

[X-ray]

"...How does that make you feel X-ray?..."
-----------------------------------------------

It would make me feel like this :-o
Ja, you guys have the worst crawlies, I would say worse even than the critters we get in SA.

@ Bloodline

Why so scared of flies?
edit: if it is a tsetse fly then fair enough, be afraid, but those are only in Africa.

[PMC]

X-ray

You should get a picture of this little fella.

We've been having mild winters and warm damp summers in the UK now for a while, so many non-indigenous species are making a home here. In Highbury there is a colony of parakeets estimated to number in the range of four thousand, plus a Leatherback Turtle was spotted swimming off the coast of Suffolk.

Which makes me wonder how many non-native arachnids there are populating the warmer parts of the UK...

[bloodline]

@ Bloodline

Why so scared of flies?

I have no idea... it's just and irrational fear, similar to your dislike of spiders I guess :-)

[Karlos]

bloodline wrote:

Ignore it. fire up your Amiga and let the Spider do it's job of eating flies... I'm terrorfied of flies, I love spiders for the sole reason that they eat flies!

I'm not afraid of flies, I just detest the filthy little buggers. All day crawling on garbage, dogsh*t and any other fetid stuff they can find, then it's in through your window to crawl all over your fruit, crockery or whatever.

For that reason I'm pro spider too :-)

[PMC]

We have something in the UK that vaguely resembles your Aussie flies...

They're usually found reporting for "The Sun".

[Karlos]

PMC wrote:
We have something in the UK that vaguely resembles your Aussie flies...

They're usually found reporting for "The Sun".

Can't say I've had any aussie flies here. Do they sound different or only hang around barbeques or empty beer cans? :-D

[PMC]

Doh! Sorry Karlos, I had you mixed up with ADZ. Must be something to do with your avatars!

Perhaps I should lay off the barbies and beer myself...

[X-ray]

There can only be one Aussie fly of note...

Even if it is a fruit-fly :-)

[Karlos]

PMC wrote:
Doh! Sorry Karlos, I had you mixed up with ADZ. Must be something to do with your avatars!

Perhaps I should lay off the barbies and beer myself...

That's quite OK. I take it you have normal colour vision? If you were of one of us, you'd actually see mine has a higher blue saturation ;-)

<- me
<- adz

See? Totally different :-D