Jury Duty Spider

Serving jury duty in York County. I was sitting in the "waiting room" which is more like a big holding cell.

A spider was hanging down from the ceiling. I'm not a good judge, but it was a high ceiling with tiles and flouresent lights, maybe 18 feet? In a room seating 175-200 people, the spider hung close to directly above where I sat the yesterday morning. I'm the only one here with the vantage point to see it. If I draw attention to it, it's dead. But there, now, it's harmless. Is it happy? Or miserable and starving? After maybe a half hour, he made it back up his web thread to the ceiling! Now he's gone, probably back between the tiles.

 

The spider came back down later. I was checking periodically, but at distance he's difficult to see unless the light is reflecting just right. He surprised me when I spotted him again, down near head-level now. After a good bit of contemplation, I had to tell the gal in front of me about the spider. I couldn't just let it end up in her hair or something, so I tapped her on the shoulder and mentioned the spider. It took her a second to see him. Then she gasped a little, and then reached out and broke the thread. He fell to the floor, but I couldn't see him - the patterned carpet of gray and black and white is not conducive to spotting escaped spiders. Maybe he would live after all!

But then she stood up and smooshed him.

RIP little guy. Hope you had a happy life.