Okay, I'm exaggerating a little. Well, more like a lot. But that's what went though my head when I first laid eyes on the sleek, black scorpion in the garage last night. I had never seen one before, except in pictures, and seeing one in real life, even if it was from a prudently safe distance, was enough to induce an immediate fear reaction and conjure up images of H. R. Giger. That thing was creepy.
Since the weather finally broke, we have been able to enjoy some of our forgotten clothing, like robes: big comfy, cozy robes. I was already wearing mine, so I was in the kitchen making a light snack for us while Chuck went downstairs to change into his. I heard Chuck nonchalantly call out, "Babe? Do we have bug spray that will kill a scorpion?" Hmmm.
Tasha, our ever-eager girl had accompanied Chuck downstairs. While he changed clothes, she went in the garage and found a new play toy. It is our habit to investigate whatever she is investigating because she is fearless, and you just never know what she will find interesting. When Chuck saw what she had found, he immediately called her away. Shockingly, she obeyed. That's when he called out to me.
I called back, just as dispassionately, "I don't know sweetheart. Let me read the label." We're both such good actors. I know he has to be disturbed, and I'm edging around the corner of mild freak out. Of course, all of our yelling back and forth has made Reku want to investigate. He slips down the stairs while I am reading the can. Finally, I can't help but ask the stupid, pointless, yet inevitable question, "Whyyyyyyyy...?" My dearly beloved answered me without even a trace of irony. I guess he knows me well enough that he realizes there was no way I could not ask, no matter how valiantly I tried.
The can didn't say one thing about scorpions, conveniently called escorpión in Spanish, so there was no way I could miss it. Even if I did, the manufacturer had kindly provided pictographs, so I was absolutely certain when I proclaimed, "no." But I brought the can downstairs with me anyway.
One glance at the bedroom door has confirmed what I suspected. When Reku came down the stairs, Chuck guided him directly into our bedroom to join Tasha and closed the door. Both dogs were safely shut away.
Now we're both in the garage, partially clad and barefoot, facing down a two-inch scorpion. Chuck decides to try the spray. I don't hold much faith in it. Everything we keep in the house is dog safe, and that shiny, black menace looked a little tougher that that.
Chuck approached to the maximum range of the bug spray can and let loose with a prolonged blast of the dog-safe poison. The scorpion writhed violently and tried repeatedly to sting anything it could, but it had no target. I was surprised by the reaction, but when Chuck stopped spraying, it looked straight back at us, as if to say "Yeah? What else ya got?"
After several 10-15 second attacks with the bug spray, it retreated under the truck. I immediately offered to jump in the truck and run it over, but Chuck vetoed that plan. When it finally emerged out the other side many minutes later, the thing didn't even have the courtesy to walk a little drunkenly. The bug spray was obviously not going to work. The can of spray would have been much more effective if we had used it to bludgeon the scorpion. In the end, the same thing did in this scorpion that I imagine has done for many of his brethren – a cowboy boot. Although probably not in the way you might think.
Chuck asked me to retrieve his boots, both pairs. When I brought them to him, he put on one pair, and then grabbed one boot from the second pair, holding it by the vamp at shoulder level like the improvised cudgel it was. Snatches of a childhood rhyme went singsonging through my head:
I hope to see a ghost tonight.
If I do
I'll take my shoe
And beat him black and blue.
He approached the scorpion and thrust the boot downward while simultaneously jumping backward. Neither one of us knows how quickly a scorpion can move. When the critter didn't emerge from under the boot, he went and picked it up. The scorpion wasn't moving, but he smashed it twice more just to make sure.
When it was finally dead, beyond any hope of spontaneous resuscitation, Chuck went to get the broom and dustpan to dispose of the carcass, and I had time to think about something that hadn't yet crossed my mind: we look like idiots.
As if summoned by the thought our neighbor walks by and asks what we are doing. I cinch the belt on my robe a little tighter and wrap my arms across my chest and tell her the story. Of course, we were spotlighted in the garage with the light on the whole time, so she already knows most of it. She kindly manages not to laugh at us too much. Despite being caught out by a neighbor, we still feel like heroes.