Snake Encounter!

I apologize for not posting anything for the last few months. I guess that is what happens when you take a job for salary and then work 50- 60 hours per week and get up at 4:00 am.

Anyways, last Monday evening, September 29th 2008 around 7:30 p.m. I had come back to my house from an evening of walking the neighborhood with my neighbor. As I returned to the house and walked up to the front door, out of the corner of my eye to the right and behind me I noticed something on the front porch. I looked behind me and there was a very nicely coiled up and comfortable Diamondback Rattlesnake! Once my brain process what it was I began to scream and franticly open the front door. The door did not open immediately. As I was screaming the neighbor heard me and she ran back towards my house, asking me what was wrong! I then yelled to her that a rattlesnake was on my porch! At that point she stopped in her tracks and said she would be back and would go get her husband.

I finally got the front door open and then Daniel came running to see what I was screaming about! He said “Oh mom it is just a snake”! I said “Fine then you get rid of it”! He of course said “I don’t think so”!

Once my neighbor came back with her husband I was now in the house and peeking out the front door! In the mean time the snake has not moved and only bothered to stick his tongue out and smell us! We have no idea as to how to get rid of it and the only solution we come up with is call 911. Well guess what? 911 will only give you a number to the local snake removal companies. After calling seven companies that will remove a snake for a large fee, no one had anybody in the area that could come out and remove the snake. One company’s did say to me “If you just leave it alone it will be gone in the morning”! DAH! No guarantee that he won’t be back the next day? (Common sense) Snake must be just passing through?!

After that frustration I got an idea, drive to the local fire station and see if I can talk them into coming out? Bad idea, they said “we don’t do that and would have no idea as to how to get rid of it”! When they were explaining this to me, Daniel called and said “the snake is dead”! I asked how and he said “a neighbor came from up the street and killed it with a shovel”! What a novel idea! Daniel explained to me on my drive home that the neighbor had to poke at the snake with a pool net to get it out from under the lip of the house! After aggravating the very comfortable snake, he killed the snake with his shovel!

So lesson learned here, if you find a snake on your porch and have safely walked passed it! Don’t call 911, call a neighbor with a shovel and you will save yourself some time and aggravation!

Oh and during this time a scorpion had been hanging out with the snake, scorpion is no longer living either!

Sorry no pictures, we forgot to take them with all this excitement!