Giant web creates bug buzz
By BILL HANNA
billhanna@star-telegram.comWILLS POINT –- If you hate creepy-crawlies, you might want to avoid Lake Tawakoni State Park where a 200-yard stretch along a nature trail has been blanketed by a sprawling spider web that has engulfed seven large trees, dozens of bushes and even the weedy ground.
But if you hate mosquitoes, you might just love this bizarre web.
"At first, it was so white it looked like fairyland," said park superintendent Donna Garde. "Now it's filled with so many mosquitoes that it's turned a little brown. There are times you can literally hear the screech of millions of mosquitoes caught in those webs."
There have been heated Internet discussions among experts that the webs were constructed by social cobweb spiders, which work together, or perhaps a mass dispersal where the arachnids spin webs to spread out from one other.
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Wow, that is really disturbing. I kind of like the part about millions of mosquitoes screeching (DIE, DIE, you little bastards!), but one thing that creeps me out more than swarms of mosquitoes is a big bunch of spiders. In a lot of ways, they really do fascinate me, and I know they eat bugs, but I really don't like to have them on me. Have you ever walked head-on into a web? Not a pleasant thing. I've also read that the average person swallows several (I believe the number was six or seven) spiders in their lifetime while sleeping. Think about it...you're sound asleep, lying on your back, your mouth falls open, and next thing you know, a spider drops down from the ceiling, and you just ate a spider. If that isn't creepy, I don't know what is. This massive web reminds me of a dream I had several years ago, where I went back to the house where I grew up, and it was loaded with spiders and their webs. There was a for sale sign in the front yard, and it had a spider hanging from it. I always meant to write a story about that, but never got around to it. Ugh, it just makes me shudder!
Ken and I finally stopped watching the ND-Michigan game in the fourth quarter, when it was 38-0. Itjust got a little too painful to keep watching. I know it's a rebuilding year, but criminy....
At least Tiger looks good to win the FedEx Cup, as he should. We were flipping back and forth between golf and football, and I finally said, "Let's just leave it on golf, okay?" Tiger's up, so I'd be very surprised if he doesn't win the Cup. Go Tiger!
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