January 2008  -- Overkill At The Snake Pit

By now, I'm sure you feel I couldn't possibly have any more snake stories to tell. But remember, we live in a 100-year-old house aptly named, "The Snake Pit." Last month, I told you about my bathroom buddy, a 5-foot black snake. Poor thing saw me with my pants down, not in an outhouse, mind you, but in our one-and-only commode inside. I learned firsthand how scary snakes can be when they're just inches away from your exposed backside.

It was the final straw. I'd had it with the snake population. We took the advice of many and bought mothballs - lots and lots of mothballs. And, in the late August heat, we threw them all under the house, locked up, and headed out of town for a week. I hoped that when we returned we would have finally solved the snake problem once and for all.

The house has never seen air conditioning, so it has never smelled "right" since our arrival. But when we returned the next week I was not prepared for what we experienced next. Before we even got out of the truck in the driveway, there was a "sting" in the air. When we opened the doors, we all nearly fainted from the smell.

I guess, in all of our "get the snakes" enthusiasm, we didn't realize that the odor of 6-7 boxes of mothballs underneath a poorly-built shack without insulation had no where to go but up in the humid, miserable heat. Nobody told us, "a couple boxes ought to fix the problem."

So, you guessed it. Not only did we get rid of all the wildlife roaming the premises that week, we couldn't even stay there ourselves. Just a couple of whiffs was enough to burn the hair right out of your nose and take your breath away. I thought we'd all die of some sort of scarred lung disease.

It was just days before school would start. I remember hoping the school had a psychologist on staff because my kids were going to surely need some real therapy on their first day.

This new development seemed to lessen the focus on the snakes. Hmmm. What was worse: the thought of a few snakes lurking around, or having to walk around in the house all week with long sleeves and pants in the humid 100-degree heat (to keep our skin from burning), wearing motorcycle goggles to protect our eyes and handkerchiefs across our faces to keep from collapsing our lungs?

I knew the snakes were still out there somewhere, just waiting for the air to clear, getting the last laugh after all.

And, if you think this is the end of the snake stories, guess again. Because if you can stand one more, I will tell you the "Big Daddy" of all my snake stories next month. It will make everything so far seem like everyday mountain life.

In the meantime, I have been thinking about what my resolutions might be for the start of a new year here in the country. Just a few of my ideas …

New Year Resolutions for Healthy Living
in The Snake Pit

* Have a snake anti-venom fundraiser (Just in case. You only get so many close calls before you're bound to make contact).

* Buy stock in the largest mothball company I can find.

* Invent some sort of snake alarm that can smell the cold-blooded critters a mile away.

* Buy a pack of trained snake dogs for back-to-back shifts of security patrol.

* Offer a reward for the capture of any snake, dead or alive.

* Get a dynamite permit (there could be a population explosion, kind of like the annual ladybug gathering around here).

* Hire an exorcist and scare the little devils right out of town.

* Beef up my blood pressure medication.

* Buy a snake voodoo kit. (Desperate times call for desperate measures.)

* Raise the house up on stilts and surround it with electric shock fence stout enough to fry on impact.

* Set up a Stop the Snakes website (I need all the advice I can get).

* Just give up and learn to live with them...

Or, last but not least,

* Just build a new house and move out of the #*%@ Snake Pit once and for all.