I have to admit I am more than a little paranoid about spiders, and since watching a brown recluse segment on PBS, I simply don't poke my fingers into places I can't see. About 75 years ago when my father was a young man a black widow fell on his arm, and he didn't even really notice a bite at the time. A few days later a doctor was attempting to calmly convince him to have the arm removed before it killed him. The doc was all for doing it immediately even if it required a couple people holding my dad down, but a 45 Colt proved sufficient to get a second opinion. One of the local "grannys" made up a "polltus" to cover the bite, and a sort of big pimple formed. A few days later a core of dead flesh fell out open to the bone, but it healed completely in a few weeks just leaving a scar. Modern medicine hasn't improved that much in the years since then (I am curious about your experience on or off list). They have some spider antivenoms, but generally don't use them unless a person has a strong reaction. From what I have heard they aren't very effective anyway, since the poison acts fairly quickly. Bites to the face, hands, or feet are often the worst since we have less "fatty" tissue to absorb the poison. As I mentioned in the first email, a LOT depends on what the spider decides to pump into a person, or how many times to bite, if at all. I've never been bitten that I know of, but I have had half a dozen black widows crawl on me at various times. The most exciting being the turtle neck sweater I put on over bare skin that had one near my shoulder wanting out, but not nearly as much as I wanted the sweater off. Big sucker too, has me shaking stuff out three decades later. The worst of it was, I KNEW it was a spider, and there is only one way to take off a turtleneck sweater, back over your head. Two side facts; the daddy long legs "type" of spider has much stronger venom than the black widow, but can't open its jaws wide enought to bite a human. And my favorite, revenge, the average person during their lifetimes eats about half a dozen spiders in their sleep.