I squished one just a few days ago that looked dead (and dessicated) until I poked at it and it started to scurry away. I didn’t notice any liquid after squishing.
I’ve been stung by one… your threshold of ‘no big deal’ is much greater than mine.
Fun story, I used to live in Taos NM where they were a concern. Once, I got up in the middle of the night to pee. I debated about turning the light on in the bathroom (I’m light sensitive), decided last minute to and there were about 15 babies scurrying around the floor.
I did not sleep well that week.
First time I traveled to Arizona on business friends told me to check my shoes for scorpions before putting them on. Didn’t find one, but I sure looked hard for them!
Another reason I prefer to live up north.
In a total of thirteen years living in the Sonoran desert we have had a scorpion inside the house exactly twice. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the key is to keep their prey out of the house. No prey, no predator. Our pest control does not treat for scorpions, but maintains a perimeter against prey critters such as crickets.
Similarly, we also use bait boxes to keep the pack rat population is check, which tends to keep the rattlesnakes away (again, no prey = no predator).
We live on the edge of a canyon with a large swath of undeveloped desert and regularly have coyotes, javalina, and bobcats about. Not a very urban setting at all.
I’ll take the very slight scorpion risk over mosquitos any day of the week.
A few years ago, Wife took her recipe book from the shelf and set it on the kitchen counter. A scorpion crawled out. She was not pleased. Since then, I hunt for them with a UV flashlight several nights/week. I get about 2 per month outside, but none inside, so far.