ahhh-lacran!

I found a scorpion in my office yesterday afternoon, lurking casually behind my chair, all innocent-like and elitist ("What, me? Sting you? I should think not."). He freaked the living heck out of me for a second, I'll tell you that. I envisioned all sorts of eight-legged running and leaping that of course never ensued. I don't know how fast scorpions can go, but I'm reasonably certain they seldom leap on things.

Anyway, I was perhaps understandably nervous as I quickly upended over him a giant plastic Youngs' Dairy cup (yes, decorated with those wacky cartoon cows - Barnabus and Cowtherine and their adorable calves, Cowvin and Calfleen - for all the Youngs' fans who are wondering).

You all remembered those were their names, right? Am I the only die-hard ex-Youngs' employee out there? Julie? Julie? (And, uh, Betty? You should probably know this too. No excuses.)

Upon returning to reality, I screwed up my courage (bolstered, of course, by my experience with Burro Creek's scary mountain lion population) and flipped him into a bin usually reserved for artifact-washing to give him a looksee but also because I figured at some point I'd have to, you know, somehow dispose of him in a more ethical way then leaving him to suffocate under Barnabus' bland yet smiley cow-ey face.

I took a few pictures, of course, to prove to you how brave I am ("Oh for heaven's sake dahling, that's so not my good side. Let me curve my stinger a bit, like this..."), and then made the first available manly faculty person take him outside for - well, first, for pranking of the IT guys next door and then eventual disposal of a shady sort which was not discussed in detail. Although I assume he was dumped into the bushes somewhere. I'll probably see him tomorrow.

One good thing came of all this: I learned from Eva, who cleans the Centre on a semi-regular basis and who has inexplicably made it her pet project to get me to a point where I can communicate basic ideas in Spanish (such as: "Hey! I saw a scorpion in here today! Hide the women and children!"), that scorpion in Spanish is alacran. Which seems slightly more appropriate.

So from this point on, when I whirl my seat around and my eye falls on a scorpion lurking nearby, I will yell, "AHHHHHHLACRAN!" And then yell for an available faculty person.