[ExI] playing possum didn't help...

[spike at rainier66.com]

…because the spider wasn’t fooled:

 

https://www.newsweek.com/watch-tarantula-opossum-amazon-rainforest-1347597

 

I read this article, and on they go about how “horrifying” it is to see a giant spider devouring a mammal.  Now I have a question please:

 

Why is this particular beast any more horrifying than any other damn thing that devours opossums?  If a bald eagle swooped down, nabbed the toothy bastard and hauled it away, what difference does it make from the possum’s point of view?  Why would care if he is to become shit either way, whether it comes outta the ass of an eagle or the abdomen of an arthropod?  I am figuring it was already dead when the spider found him, pretty likely from natural causes, for if a mammal with aaaallll thoooose teeeeth loses a fight against a cold-blooded slow moving BUG, then he deserves to be devoured for such a poor showing, sheesh.  He would be dead anyway, from embarrassment!  It would be like that guy in Hitchcock’s The Birds, with his marvelous opposable thumbs, losing a fight to a damn flock of beaks.  Beaks!  Shaaaameful.

 

Think about it: a giant spider isn’t particularly dangerous.  Tarantulas are actually rather gentle beasts.  You can let them walk on your hands or bare skin, they don’t bite.  They never figure out they are walking on a big hunk of meat, never try to reach down and tear out a piece of you.  They can never get bigger than this dude, regardless of what you do (Hulk-inducing gamma rays?) because spiders don’t have lungs.  The square-cube law catches them at this point.  They can’t really even move fast at this size.  Watch tarantulas in the wild: no hustle at all.  There is NO EXCUSE for a possum to lose to one, a rat, a mouse, anything warm blooded should be able to easily kick his abdomen.

 

In any case, the whole episode makes me realize this is an opportunity to make a buttload of money.  I didn’t even know such things existed over in the rainforest.  I can’t imagine where Bezos has been hiding them.  I know it rains a lot in the Seattle area, but I never knew Amazon had their own rainforest.  So I learn something new this day.

 

In any case… you know that some people like to keep scary dangerous pets.  Usually it’s just rattlesnakes and bulldogs and boring stuff like that, but now we can supply some really fun nightmarey stuff like this.  We sneak over there, you distract the guards over at Amazon, I grab a coupla these things, a good healthy-looking mating pair, breed em, sell em, oh man, we could be rich and famous.  You can cover famous, I’ll do rich.

 

spike

 

 

 

 

 

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