I have found myself to be in a vanishingly small group of people, in that I like spiders. I chuckle at the people who blindly assert that man is obviously the pinnacle of all creation. Just look at the capabilities and engineering in a typical spider.

Anyway, I have nicely sized spider (probably an inch and a half across) crawling around my walls, keeping the insect population in check. He seems a friendly sort, he let me put the lens of my camera within two inches of him to take the attached photo. Being a spider fanboy doesn't mean I'm not cautious, however. Some of these little beasties can be downright nasty, not to mention dangerous.

Does anybody know enough about spiders to tell me whether this one is actually harmless? It is not one of the four species of spiders [Black Widow; Brown Recluse; Hobo; Yellow Sac] in North America known to be truly dangerous, but other lesser spiders can cause unpleasant effects.

tanstaafl.