Snakes....yuck
There's an absolutely disgusting picture of a humongous snake in the newspaper today. It freaked me out but I confess I was rivetted to it for a quite some time. It showed the thick trunk of a 4m long burmese python in the Everglades that 'bit off more than it could chew'. There was a 1.8m alligator with its tail sticking out. Looked like the snake's body just broke in the middle....maybe cos the alligator was wiggling too much.
Awful. Awful. Awful.
I'm so glad the papers were on the table and I was standing whilst reading it. Had I been sitting down and holding it close to my face, with my specs off, it would've been mortifying.
The thing that gets my heart pounding besides vigorous exercise is close encounters of the reptilian kind.....even in picture form. There have been many an occasion where I simply throw the National Geographic on the floor when I turn the page and discover a snake. I usually don't bother to pick up the magazine after that. It's convenient to have children to do these menial tasks when I'm immobilised.
I've also had a few memorable snake encounters in person.
There was the snake that Tina and I thought was dead, wrapped up in a plastic bag and at the bottom of the garbage bin outside her house. To our horror, it came out 'standing' tall and promptly headed for the nearest drain. I've mentioned before how circumstances merely reveal the person. Well, Tina ran after the snake while I ran away from it. It took great persuasion on her side to get me to come help her pin it down.
Then there was the time the snake fell out of the tree and landed merely a metre away from Elliott's pram. I was wondering why this 'green leaf' had the ability to slide away toward the drain. Snakes always seem know which direction the drains are. I'm so grateful I did not walk that split second faster. I always wonder what I would have done if the snake had landed inside the pram. Would my maternal instincts have quenched my fear and gut instinct to run away?
Actually I have a lot more snake stories to share, but think this is enough for one day!