Daddy Longlegs

my dad was highly arachnophobic, flinching at even quite tiny spiders -- he was totally unbothered by harvestmen though, he said they moved in a different and non-scary way

(he was a naturalist, but his geek thing was plants)

it isn't the legginess of spiders that makes them unsettling so much as the other appendages on their heads that drag on the ground (palps I think?)

ok for research purposes i googled trypophobia arachnophobia: never do this

Interesting thing is, I encountered a dragonfly of some sort earlier. Basically a daddy long legs but the moral and spiritual implications are totally different.

Wha? Those fuckers are like 90% wing.

I suppose but there's still a sort of bumpy clumsy dangly body and legs element, just it's okay because it's shiny and nice. You feel brushed by a shiny friend instead of harassed

you only like them for their chitinous exoskeletons

dragonflies have nice big bulbous heads w/huge eyes, crane fly heads are clearly designed by gary larson

so this morning (and unusually) i noticed a crane fly* aka mosquito hawk on my bathroom wall. i am in a mood to be superstitious** currently, and my first thought was "uh oh" (second: "that's unusual")

i am no longer mortally afraid of them, as i was when tiny (see upthread) but they never come into my bathroom and are rare in london at all in my experience, and i was made uneasy by the visit

just now, not looking carefully while brushing my teeth and moving a plastic soap dispenser, i managed to half-drown and half-squish it, washing it (possibly already dead) into the plughole but not yet down the plughole. i am now in a mood to be MUCH MORE superstitious and uneasy :( :( :(

*daddy longlegs, call it by its name
**Superstition

Picturing those legs clambering back out of the plughole