Giant Spider On the Loose? Oh, Good.

There are some things I can go without for the rest of my life, if circumstances called for it. Bananas are one of those things--they bruise easily, they add needless filler to banana splits, and they don't fit easily in the fridge the way other fruits do. Now I have another reason to hate the cursed yellow food.

In a German supermarket, a 5-inch Brazilian spider hopped out of a banana crate and decided it was time for a shopping spree. (And you just KNOW if you ended up behind the spider at the checkout line, the damn arachnid would write a check to pay for ten bucks worth of groceries, and use all sorts of expired coupons) The Germans, who until now were on a 66-year spree of acting calm and collected, evacuated the store and bombed it with more chemicals than the Chicago River. They're pretty certain that the damn thing is dead, but no body has been found.

Why, you might ask, can't we just accept this spider as a pet, and allow it to have helpful effects on the local ecology by killing insects? Well, it turns out that this particular spider is "aggressive" and has a venemous bite that causes excruciating pain, paralysis, asphyxiation, and "painful erections that last many hours and can lead to impotence in humans". It is not clear whether the impotence is caused by the venom, or the fact that once you've been bitten by a five inch spider you've lost the ability to find joy or arousal in anything ever.

And now there's a decent chance that this spider is at Oktoberfest, drunk and partying with frat boys and English tourists, just waiting to spread a wave of fear across Europe.

Thanks, Brazil. This is why we can't have nice things.