American House Spiders Unite - No Sacrifice Required!

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A female American House Spider, Parasteatoda tepidariorum. Apparently, she is still alive and kicking

Identified at Spider Identification Org, by Bug Eric,

a.k.a. Eric Eaton author of the Kaufman Field Guide to Insects of North America.

Having read too many articles about how to be a good parent, I thought she had left her poor decayed body behind to feed her offspring, but Eric says that she looks alive. I guess she is simply hanging around waiting to see what kind of peanut butter the kids want to go with their flies.

In the photo below, she is waiting for her kids to emerge. I guess this is the equivalent of reading a magazine in the parking lot.

Any Bugs in the Bell?

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After 14 hours on a plane from Frankfurt, Wolfgang figures perhaps, there COULD be bugs in his horn bell. I played French Horn up through the end of middle school. Which made my position on the stage in Memorial Church, just behind the brass section from the Junge Kammerphilharmonie Freiburg even more enjoyable.

In my case, the drummers sat off to the right of us. Being the third french horn, lowest in the pecking order, I was the target of their happy-go-lucky juvenile male behavior. The only instruments with more time on their hands than horns are drums Though the french horns had a lot of rests to count, the drums had even more, and so they needed something to do to occupy their time, while waiting their time to play.

We practiced in the school cafeteria before school. These resourceful fellas would gather up old pieces of stale food and, when I leaned on my horn, counting, or was otherwise distracted by my best friend, the second french horn, they would toss old french fries and stale pieces of hamburger buns into my horn bell. Then when it was my turn to blow, out would come a fusillade of ancient bits of lunch.

At the age of twelve and thirteen, it didn't seem funny to me at all, but it sure does now.

Concert Details and

my other art-journal entries about this performance can be found at

* On Stage

* Playing Beethoven