Conflicted

I hate centipedes.  I really do.  The thought of them gives me shivers down my spine.  Every last one of those little squirming legs just makes me want to run as fast and as far as I possiblly can in the opposite direction.

Our laundry is in our basement, much to my disappointment.  This might not be as big a deal if we had one of those lovely "finished" basements--you know the ones that feel more like a part of your house than a part of a dungeon--but then, if we did have a "finished" basement, we would probably have a house new enough that the laundry wouldn't be down there anyway.  But alas, I digress.... as usual.

I try to keep the area as free from small scary creatures as I can, but there are always spiderwebs and centipedes that I can't keep up with.  I generally prefer going down there during the day to lessen my encounters with said scary creatures.  But tonight I was really trying to get some wash done, so I slowly crept downstairs, trying as hard as I could to keep my eyes peeled for any, ANY, movement.

Then I saw it--not a centipede or a daddy-long-leg, like my usual findings--but a large black spider.  Now spiders don't usually upset me all that much.  They're way less scary than centipedes, I think.  But this one, well, it's size got me to feeling like I didn't really want to be standing a foot away from it loading the clothes into the washer.

So, of course, I did what any woman would do.  I yelled for the man of the house.

Down came my chivalrous knight in shining armor, and he captured the enemy in one swift encounter.  But as he took it upstairs, I suddenly felt conflicted.

Would this spider, left to live downstairs (instead of taken outside, where I had originally banished him), actually kill those most-evil of creatures?  Would he actually help me in my fight against the centipede?

Suddenly I was unsure of my decision... Which did I like less--the idea of a large spider lurking right by where I do the laundry, or the idea that there might be more centipedes scurrying around than would otherwise if it were kept alive.

Decisions, decisions.  Ultimately, I opted to stick with my original thought.  Outside he was taken, hopefully to find another home.  Further from mine.  I do wish I could fight this centipede war with an ally a little less frightening than a large spider....