The Spider.

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but I am deathly afraid of spiders. I'm not exaggerating.

One time I found a tiny (like, the size of a sugar ant) spider crawling on me. I screamed. Loudly. For a whole minute. While flailing around like an idiot trying to get it off me. But all that did was make the spider fall down my shirt to where I could no longer see it. Defeated, I sat down and cried for the next five minutes.

It was a truly traumatic experience and I am scarred for life by it.

Spider - 1, Kayla - 0.

Last week, I had just finished locking our dogs up in their crates in the garage for the night, when I heard one of them crying. I ignored it at first, but the crying persisted and my mom had me go check on them to see what was wrong.

As soon as I opened the garage door, of course the crying stopped. Unable to figure out what was wrong, I went back inside and began to get ready for bed. The crying started again.

This time I went and actually let them back outside for a few minutes in case someone just needed to go to the bathroom or run around or something. After a couple of minutes, I locked them back up and went back inside.

About five minutes later, the crying began again. My mom told me just to let them out and leave them out. So I went into the garage, let them out of their crates, and then followed them to the garage door to let them into the backyard.

As we were walking to the door, I saw a big black spot on one of my dogs. At first I thought it was just dirt, but then I noticed it was moving. I looked again and sure enough -- a GIANT spider (probably the size of a quarter, which qualifies as giant as far as spiders are concerned) was hitching a ride on my dog.

My dog who was now standing in between me and the door to the backyard. Which meant that a giant spider was standing between me and the door to the backyard.

I froze. I began to panic. I screamed. And then I turned around and ran inside, slamming the door behind me.

"THERE'S A GIANT SPIDER ON BUCK!" I screamed at my mom. "HE'S STANDING IN FRONT OF THE DOOR. I WOULD HAVE TO GO NEAR THE SPIDER. I CAN'T LET THEM OUT."

My mom convinced me that the spider was probably not on him anymore and to try again. I cracked open the door to see my very confused dogs wondering why I left them loose in the garage. I looked at Buck. I saw the spider. And it had doubled in size (now the size of a half-dollar coin). I screamed. I slammed the door. I went into hysterics yelling things like "I CAN'T DO IT" and "WHAT IF IT EATS ME?"

I almost made my mom who had just had shoulder surgery and was already settled into her recliner for the night get up and put them away, but she convinced me to try once more.

I opened the door. I looked at my still very confused dogs. I examined Buck closely. I didn't see anything. I took a step out. It still looked good. Maybe the spider was no longer on him.

But wait.

If the spider was no longer on Buck...then OH MY GOSH THE SPIDER WAS IN THE GARAGE SOMEWHERE WAITING TO EAT ME.

Enter adrenaline rush. Unsure of where the spider was lurking, I ran to the side door, yelling at Buck the whole time to STAY AWAY FROM ME. I opened the door, they ran out, and I slammed the door shut behind me as I ran screaming back inside.

Spider - 2, Kayla - 0.

I came back inside to find my mom literally dying from laughing at me. I was less amused.

"The spider wasn't on Buck anymore and now I'm afraid it's hiding somewhere on me," I said, offended that my mom was laughing at me when my life was at stake.

Suddenly, she stopped laughing and looked at me. She had this really serious, concerned look on her face. And then she gasped.

And that was all it took.

I screamed bloody murder and jumped a couple feet into the air, flailing my arms around for about two seconds. And then, as my mom once more burst into laughter, I realized what a cruel trick she had just played on me.

Spider - 2, Mom - 1, Kayla - 0.

But don't worry. One day, when it is proven that spiders are in fact little tiny demons that steal your soul and then kill you, I will have the last laugh, and my score will finally be Kayla - 1.

P.S. I was going to add a picture of a spider for effect, but I couldn't do it. The pictures on Google were horrifying and I couldn't look long enough to decide on one.

And Then the Clouds Came Out.

My day was...stressful, mostly. Let me start at 7:00 this morning.

I had a speech today in speech class. A speech I was freaking out about. Especially since I had a dream the other night that I was COMPLETELY unprepared for it.

We had a lot of stuff to bring for it: an outline, a reference page, a visual aid, and a memory card so she could record us. I double checked last night to make sure I had everything I needed. And I checked again this morning.

Anyway, I got up early because I had to make sure I looked okay and everything, you know, cuz the whole class would be staring at me. My car was also out of gas, so I needed to stop at a gas station so that my car didn't break down or anything on my way to school.

So I leave earlier than normal to get gas and get there in plenty of time to prepare for my speech. It's 7:15 and I'm probably about 10 minutes away from my house when I remember a dream I had last night.

In my dream, it was speech day, and I didn't have my memory card. Thankfully, in my dream, the teacher had extra cards so it wasn't a big deal. But that got me thinking...did I pack my card? I didn't double check this morning to make sure I had it...did I pack it last night? I couldn't remember. So as I'm driving I have one hand in my bag digging around for it. And I can't find it. So I take the next exit, pull into a gas station, and do a thorough search of my bag. Nothing.

So now I'm starting to panic. I'm going to have to go home and get it. But what if it's not there? Then I would have just wasted about 20 minutes. So I decide to call my mom to have her check and see if it's still sitting on my desk. I call her twice, and there's no answer. So I start driving back. I decide to call my dad, even though I know he's at the airport dropping off my grandpa, just in case he's back already. But he's not. So, it's about 7:25 now and I run inside (leaving my car on because I don't have time to turn it off, and praying that no one steals it). Thankfully, it's still on my desk so I grab it and run. I'm in and out in about 30 seconds. Record time.

Anyway, I made it to school barely on time. I walked in right at 8, as opposed to about 7:30 when I would have gotten there had this little setback not happened. As you can imagine, I was a little frazzled the rest of the morning. And imagining everything that could go wrong. And feeling like I was going to throw up on the person in front of me (except no one sits in front of me, so I guess that's a plus).

But I think my speech went pretty well. Everything worked and I didn't forget anything and I stayed (barely) within the time limits. So, now I just have to wait for my evaluation.

By the way, I think the dream I had, and the fact that I remembered it before I was too far from home, was totally a God thing. Because He's awesome like that.

The next stressful thing that happened was one of my professors scheduled a test on a day that I'm not going to be in class...so now I have to talk to him and see if I can take it another time and then figure out a time I can take it which is going to be difficult because I have approximately 15 minutes of free time between the hours of 8 and 4 on weekdays. And I doubt he'll let me take the test at home.

And THEN to top it all off, I went to McDonald's for lunch and ordered my usual cheeseburger, plain and dry. PLAIN AND DRY. I go to eat my burger after I leave and it has ketchup, pickles, mustard, and onions on it. Not the definition of plain and dry.

So I had to wait until I got to work to eat it so I could scrape off all the gross stuff because it's hard to do that in the car. But by then, it was getting cold and the cheese was gross and the ketchup and mustard had absorbed into the bread. So, being the clever person that I am, I cut off the parts of the bread that I couldn't eat. And it still tasted terrible, and I almost threw up once (that's twice today, folks), but at least I wasn't hungry.

And then, as if it knew exactly how my day was going,  the sun disappeared and a billion clouds came out of nowhere and made the sky all gray and dark. I even took off my sunglasses. Y'all, I once wore my sunglasses while watching fireworks because they were too bright for my sensitive eyes. This is a big deal.

I kept thinking today was Tuesday, because normally these things happen to me on Tuesdays. (Tuesdays hate me, if you haven't heard). But thankfully, it is Thursday, tomorrow is Friday (Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday...haha. Now it's in your head.) and then it's the WEEKEND. My favorite word. (After euphemism, of course).

On the bright side, I was totally having a great hair day. It was all soft and everything.

Tonight, My Worst Nightmare Came True.

I always knew it would happen eventually. But deep down, I always hoped it wouldn't. It was the worst thing ever. I was so scared. I was about to cry.

That's right: I got lost driving home, and my phone was dead.

Those of you who know me well are probably laughing your face off right about now.

It was the worst experience ever. I was driving home from babysitting over in Lake Worth. I couldn't remember exactly how to get home, but I knew I was supposed to go on 820. I wasn't sure if it was east or west, but I live in the southwest, so I went for west.

Last time I came home from their house, 820 took me to 35, and I could easily get home from there. So I'm on 820, and I am NOT seeing 35. 820 West turned into 820 South. Last time I drove on 820 South, I never ran into 35. Instead I ran into 20, and got home that way. So, as I'm driving down 820, I see a sign for 20 West, and think "Oh, that's where I'm supposed to go!" I exit. I immediately know that was a mistake.

Nothing looks familiar. There are no street signs. No exits. Nowhere to turn around. My phone is dead. Is this really happening to me???

 I keep driving. 5 minutes later...a sign! A sign with the words "Weatherford" and "Abilene," and another sign that says "Aledo."

Um...what happened to Fort Worth?

At this point I'm pretty sure I've gone too far west, so I exit Aledo, turn around, and get on what I think is 20 East.

Now all I see are signs for Dallas, Shreveport, and downtown, none of which are places I want to go. Suddenly, the exit numbers start over at 1...wait a minute. Whenever I'm traveling on 20 East, the exit I take to get home is like 300-something...

There's no way I'm this far from home.

That's when I realize I've somehow ended up on 30 East. I'm so confused.

I see a sign for 820 South, and am about to turn back on it, when I see the next sign up says "Las Vegas Trail". I KNOW THAT SIGN! It's right after (or before, when coming east) Cherry Lane, where I have my voice lessons. So I continue on 30 and make my way home from there. Let's just say I was kind of in a rush to get home before my parents filed a missing person's report on me.

So, in a nutshell, tonight I left Lake Worth around 11, took a quick detour through Aledo, and barely made it home in time for the 12 o'clock curfew. And, in another nutshell, what I learned is: charge my phone and bring a map.

Yeah...you'd think I'd have learned that by now...

*By "tonight," I definitely mean last Friday night, when this happened and I wrote this. My internet was being stupid and wouldn't let me post it last week. This is the first chance I've gotten to post it since my internet's been back up. :)