Get ready for an influx of spiders Australia.

RED ALERT, AUSSIES. RED. ALERT.

It’s go-time. It’s the end of the road. It is ON like KONG.

We have to leave the country. Why? Because the spiders are taking over.

Thanks to the combination of a rainy spring, followed by the wet-one-day, dry-the-next summer Australia is having (couldn’t possibly be climate change, could it? Nooooo) an influx of spiders is being reported. It’s not a ‘plague’, however – the thing is, there aren’t MORE spiders, they are just more visible.

In the most disgusting sentence I’ve ever read, Queensland Museum’s arachnologist Dr Robert Raven told news.com.au that spiders “can’t survive outside so they go inside because they have sensitive leg hairs. So when the rain comes, houses can be full of spiders.”

Sensitive leg hairs. We are seeing more spiders indoors because they have SENSITIVE LEG HAIRS. Vommmitttttttttttttttt.

As you may have been able to tell by my dramatics, I am a bona fide arachnophobic. Like, weekly nightmares, tears, sweats, and the occasional spew when someone tags me in a video of a tarantula (friends are cruel, aren’t they?). So I am just THRILLED about the news we’ll be seeing more spiders pop-up and say hello.

:

But let’s see how we can use it to our advantage, here are eight ways to make the spider influx work for you this season. (One suggestion per leg.)

(Before you call the R.S.P.C.Spiders on me, the below suggestions are obvi a joke. Also, I never kill spiders – not because of all the crap about them not wanting to harm me/they keep the room free of insects/they are more scared of me/blah blah blah etc – but because I am terrified that if I kill a Huntsman, his cousins will come and crawl down my throat in my sleep.)

Stick cotton wool to each foot of a Huntsman, so he may dust as he goes.

The corners of your ceiling will be cleaner than ever. Now, don’t glue the cotton wool to his feet. Just make it into some cute lil’ spider-sized booties, and he’ll just slip them on himself.

Train your house spider to attack intruders.

I think it will be easy to do this. It seems to work in kids’ movies, like Jungle 2 Jungle and… um… nah, I’m out. Suggestions welcome.

Use the web to knit stuff.

If you have a friendly infestation of web spiders, just start knitting scarves. Ask the spiders nicely and they might even let you knit straight out of their bums.

Get him to turn the oven on right before you get home.

He has eight legs, so surely he can pre-heat the oven ready for you to start cooking dinner. Or would he need opposable thumbs to do that? DO SPIDERS HAVE THUMBS?! VOMMMITTTTT

Number one, but with tiny mops.

So then when he scuttles across the floor and scares the living bejeezus out of everyone in the room, he leaves a neat little trail of clean tiles.

Speed the kids up in the morning.

Need help forcing the children out of bed? Encouragement to brush their teeth and get the hell ready? Calmly hold a funnel web spider in front of their little faces. They'll move. Holy pincers, they will move.

Let one crawl on your face for a soothing massage.

It's a matter of time until some pharmaceuticals company releases spider venom as the next wonder ingredient for anti-ageing. Get a head start. Put your house spiders on your face, those eight little legs will release a whole lot of tension, too.

Train him to take aerial Instagram photos.

Selfie sticks just aren't long enough these days. Hand your smartphone to the spider on your ceiling, and get him to take a few natural 'just woke up' photos. The angle will be so flattering. #arachnagram

See? We're going to be FINE, Australia. Everyone stay calm. Now, someone pass me the matches and my passport. I need to burn my house down before I leave the country.