The Snake Incident

It was bound to happen.  I mean, I live in OK.  There's suppose to be snakes all over the place.  And I've seen them dead on the side of the road.

I just wasn't expecting to see it right outside my door.

So, sit right back and I'll tell you a tale of the zombie snake.

Monday evening we headed back up to the camper a bit earlier than normal.  The kids had a new movie they wanted to watch and I had agreed to make them popcorn.

A few minutes after the first batched was popped, I heard the mutt barking outside.  Then I realized he was barking AT the camper.  That wasn't normal.  So I opened the door to see what he was barking at.

And there it was.  Four feet from the front door.  Right next to the pallet walkway.  Yeah, the one we walked on about 15 minutes before to get into the camper.

I slammed the door shut and started to panic.  What was I going to do?  How do I convince the dog to leave it alone long enough to let it get away?  How do I keep the mutt from getting bitten?

Feeling a bit braver, I opened the door again and (hung out the door) snapped a picture so the kids could see what the dog was barking at.  They thought it was the coolest thing ever.

Still shaking, I tried to think rationally.  It can't stay there all night, right?  Maybe I should try to get the dog away from it.  Nope, mutt's too intent on protecting his family and isn't going to stop barking.  Hmm, maybe I can scare it away.

So I grabbed my .22 pistol.  Hung out the camper door again and fired. Again. Again. Again. Again and again.  Maybe I'm shaking a bit too much to be able to aim with a pistol...

Back inside to grab the Davy Cricket.  It's only a single shot.  Better grab some extra ammo.

Still shaking, I opened the door and very carefully stepped down onto the deck.  Rifle to shoulder I fired.  And the snake started moving.  I tried to reload to get another shot off, but yup, you guessed it.  Still shaking too much to be able to get the ammo in.

I watched the snake slither under the camper and realized that I had actually hit it that time.  Great, now I have an injured rattlesnake under the camper and a dog (now on the backside of the camper) still intent on not letting it get away.

I decided there wasn't anything I could do about it, so I let the dog bark and hoped he wouldn't get bitten.  After about an hour, he finally stopped barking and came back around to his rug by the front door.

(I should add a note in here about the text messages I was sending Sarge...  That he was getting out of order without pictures.  And the ensuing panicked phone call to the main house at 10pm to try and figure out if he needed to come home early from work.)

I hoped this was the end of the snake incident, but I was wrong.

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Early the next morning I poked my head out to have a look around.  Didn't see anything, so I stepped onto the deck to look under the camper.  Oh good.  I didn't see the snake.  So I went out for a run.  Making sure I was extra vigilant about what was around me.

Back from my run and the kids were starting to stir.  Of course, the first thing they wanted to know was where the snake was.  So I told them.  I have no idea.  

A bit later I (half jokingly) told Junior to go out and fill up the water tank.  And he looked out the back window and said "There's the snake!"

And there was the mutt laying right next to it.  

We watched him for a bit nose the snake, roll over and play dead next to it and then lose interest and walk away.

He looked a little like this, except with a dead rattlesnake laying next to him.

I knew at this point I was going to have to go out and move the snake away from the camper.  So I pulled on my cowboy boots and headed out to grab the pooper scooper.

Except the snake wasn't where it had been...

It had moved.

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My heart kind of jumped into my throat as a looked around panicked thinking I should have grabbed the gun and not the pooper scooper.

But then I saw it.  About 6 feet away, flipped over on it's back.  The mutt must have decided to try to play with it and then realized it was too heavy/ no fun when it was dead.

I picked it up and decided I was going to play a joke on Sarge.  I placed it on top of the burn barrel (as coiled up as I could get it without having to touch it) and put the screen back over the top.

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We finished up our school work and got ready to head down to the main house for lunch.  As we're walking out the door, Squish asked to see the snake, so I picked him up and walked over to the burn barrel to show him the snake.  

Except it wasn't there.

I stopped in a panic and slowly backed away from the barrel.  

Thankfully I turned around when I did, or I would have stepped on the snake...  Laying on the ground...  Out of the barrel...

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Closest I can figure is that the mutt tried one last time to play with the snake.

As we were walking in the main house, the phone started ringing.  It was Sarge.  Just a bit panicked.  After receiving text messages that made no sense and then not being able to reach me (my phone is very spotty at the camper).  He was ready to drive home and make sure everything was ok.

I filled him in on what had happened (and why we were down later than we normally are).  

And then I got the riot act =)

When that was finished, he asked if I had cut the rattles off and put the rest of it in the maggot bucket for the chickens.

I love Sarge.  He's the best =)