Spiders

Grabbed myself a boat to San Marcos yesterday. Not a lot to see. All sorts of healing practises going on there. If I'd brought along enough quetzals, I might have had my shoulder taken care of with acupuncture.

I didn't stay long. The boat ride was more exciting than the town. Everything was calm the day I arrived in Jaibalito. Those days are gone and the surf is up on the lake with high winds. Boats rise and slap those waves and it's like hitting concrete every time they land. After a few spine jarring clobbers, I learned to raise my bum off the seat whenever I felt that weightless rise.

This will be my last night in Jaibalito. One more bone crushing boat ride back to Panajachel in the morning and then I'll decide to go where next. If Antigua isn't as cold as Xela, maybe there, or maybe Monterrico.

I used to kill those big flat wall climbing spiders on principle just to make sure I would'nt wake up with one climbing up my nose but other people tell me they're benign. They're supposed to keep the bug population under control. They sure look like they eat enough. Now I'm enlightened and I let them crawl. It sure is tempting though. Look at the one I found right above the head of my bed this afternoon. What a beast. Don't you just want to smash it?

I talked to another visitor yesterday typing away on the computer with one hand. His other hand was swollen to three times its normal size. Bad bad spider bite. This guy was in agony even with the heavy pain killers they gave him in Panajachel. Dirty red streaks of sepsis ran all the way up his arm. Prognosis for relief? Twenty days, they told him. He didn't even feel the bite when it happened. The theory is that it happened when he was hiking through the bushes, not while he was sleeping. Whatever it was, I hope the big wall crawlers I've been sparing earn their keep and devour it when it comes creeping into my blankets.