View from the North 40: Not quite science-y science

I don’t want to be thought of as less than a serious amateur scientist, but at some point my home-based research projects always come to loggerheads with what is widely considered to be real life, and then I have to choose between being enthralled and being civilized.

Yes, this means I have a spider growing up in my bathroom again this year.

No, I don’t particularly like spiders, but I’m fascinated by watching the spider grow from a little eight-legged smidgeon of arachnid to a full-bodied predator looking for the mate of its choice.

Spider-watch 2.0 is not necessarily an upgraded project, but it certainly has new plot and design elements to warrant a stay of execution and a study period for the spider. Like last year’s spider, this one started out as a bitty-bit of baby spider no bigger than the tip of a dull pencil, and it took up residence above the lights of the bathroom vanity.

And get this: They don't leave their web, AND the web is in the exact same spot as last year's spider’s — directly in line with the sink over the middle light bulb — but it is no relation at all to last year’s spider. None. It’s not even from the same breed of spider, so why would it go to the same spot?

Aren’t you at least a little bit curious about that? Wouldn’t you leave the spider, too, if only to watch the National Geographic special to be played out in front of you again? Maybe try to understand the universal truth of spider behavior?

This little spider is equally prissy and industrious as last year’s. Each evening, little gnats manage to squirm their bodies through the screen to buzz around the lights and get caught in the web. The little spider then rushes to the trapped gnats and wraps up the little buggers to be eaten later, like a frozen dinner. Each morning, the sink is littered with little spent corpses and the web is repaired and in mint condition.

The web-action can be viewed from anywhere in the bathroom, and honestly, in this era of constant entertainment from the moving picture industry, it’s kind of nice to have a little in-real-life scenario played out for my amusement. It gives me something to watch while brushing my teeth, occupying the throne or drying off from a shower.

But the situation has reached a critical juncture, a time for decision-making.

Like my grasses and clovers that I left to grow to maturity to make seeds for my pasture — and my yard — it may be time to retire the project.

My grasses were already 5 feet tall when my parents visited just before the Fourth of July. This jungle did not impress them as much as it did me.

I explained that I was letting everything go to seed this year because of recent stresses on the soil and vegetation by telling them that I was working on a new lawn-care fashion called “Early Fire Hazard.” They weren't amused, either.

As fire season heats up in the area, that one-liner is looking all too real and none too funny anymore, so down it will go — with success, though. My plant science project has at least 50 percent of the vegetation gone to seed. For the win.

As for the not-so-little-anymore spider, my worry is that she will soon be enthralled by the notion to get herself in the family way. Yes, that's a scientific term.

While our symbiotic relationship works well to keep me amused, pondering a mystery of life and keeping her fed, I won’t modify our arrangement to accommodate a passel of one or two thousand spider babies. That’s a deal breaker.

My bathroom is far too small for me to be flailing about, shrieking, as I defend myself from a spider invasion, so I’m thinking it’s time to release the spider into the wild (aka, my barn).

Next year will be the proving grounds for my research. Will the grasses and clovers come up thicker? Will another spider come to live its prepubescent weeks in my bathroom? Will my husband continue enabling my science-y notions as long as they don't extend to the refrigerator?

(I never said I was a proper scientist at [email protected].)