Once upon a time there was a scorpion...

It's a brand new year! Well, not "brand new" exactly. It's already a week old. Like, if the year 2013 were a DVD purchased on New Year's Eve at 11:59 pm, "brand new" would be sealed in clear plastic with those horrible stickers on the opening edges of the DVD box, you know, the ones that read the movie's title and either have to be cut or peeled off to open the box. "Brand new" might even be in the bottom of the plastic Walmart bag with the receipt, spare change, and Chapstick that you bought on impulse while waiting in line to check out. No, 2013 is not brand new. At a week old, 2013 is sitting open next to the TV, freed from it's clear plastic prison. 2013 has been watched and, as the novelty of the new year has worn off, may be collecting dust. Depending on how rough you were bringing in the new year, it may have little scratches on the surface.

Wait, what was my point?

Oh yeah! We're in 2013 now. I had to address the "new" thing because this is the first blog I've written this year. Anyway.

I don't really have anything specific to say or tell you, but I haven't written a blog in a while and I felt like it. Let's see..hmmm, hmmm, hmmm.

Oh, okay! I am going to tell you the story of the time I got stung on the foot by a scorpion!

Once upon a time...

No, I'm totally kidding. About the "Once upon a time thing", anyway. I did get stung, and I'll tell you about it as soon as I can stop getting distracted.

ANYWAY!

On the evening of July 24th, 2012 (I know cuz I just looked at my Twitter) I was sitting on the couch in the living room of the house I live in with my dad, watching TV. I have my own little special spot on the couch that I always sit- there's this permanent indent there now. Well, to be honest, it's not just my spot- I kind of share it with my cat Betty. We both sit there when we're alone on the couch and when we're both there we compromise by having her sit on my lap. Damn it! I'm getting distracted again!
Anyway, on that particular night I was watching TV alone since my dad had already gone up to bed. I had to get up to go do something and swung my feet off the couch. I suddenly felt a sharp pain on the side of my right foot. I jerked it back and looked at it because I figured I had set it down on a goathead (a kind of little thorn-like thing that can be found all over New Mexico) but there was nothing there, even though my foot still had this sharp, lingering pain. So I looked down at the floor where my foot had hit and saw nothing... except a huge scorpion wandering across the rug. The next few minutes are kind of a blur to me because I think I went into maximum panic mode. However, I know I went with my first instinct, which was to retract all of my limbs in as close as possible to my body and watch in breathless horror as the (probably equally terrified, as he had almost been squished) scorpion crept away from me. I stayed this way until he crawled out of sight- it was at this point that I realized I should have squished or captured him, but in my panic I did not care. I ran up the stairs two at a time and arrived breathless to my dad's room where he was lying on his bed watching baseball.
"DAD! I just got stung by a scorpion!" I choked out. "I-i-i-it was under my foot I stepped on it and stings and it's under the couch what if it stings the dogs and I should have caught it but what do I do---"
"Wait!" he calmly cut into my senseless muttering. "What?"
I repeated myself more slowly and we looked at my foot. It still stung and there was a small bump that was pretty red but other than that I was fine. Well, physically.
He asked me how big the scorpion was and I tried to think back. In my memory the scorpion was roughly the size of a small cat but I doubted that was accurate. "About two inches long" was what I finally came up with.
He had me sit next to him for a few minutes just in case I went into anaphylactic shock or something. I didn't, and used the time to text my mom and sister.
It was during this that I observed just how differently the two sexes can react to trauma. I texted my mom and sister- "I just got stung by a scorpion!!!" and the reactions I got were "Oh my god! Are you okay?" "What happened?! Are you gonna be alright?"
Meanwhile, my dad serenely watched baseball.
After a few minutes, it became quite obvious that I wasn't about to suffer a fatal allergic reaction. Eyes still aimed at the TV, my dad asked in a casual voice, "So... are you sure it was a scorpion?"
"Yes," I replied curtly.
He chuckled. "Well, we better go look for it."

We looked for a while, and of course it was no where to be found. Well, when I say "we", I mean he did most of the searching and lifting the couches up while I trailed behind him stepping gingerly.

Really, the whole thing was rather anti-climactic but it was an experience nonetheless. It's funny- in many aspects of my life I feel that I am grown-up and I can be strong and tough but something about arachnids makes me act and feel about 5 years old.

Happy "new" year!

Sarah