Totally forgot to mention this yesterday. Halfway to work there is an abandoned business just beside the highway. It's been many things over the years: laundromat; convenience store; car lot, and probably a couple of other things I've forgotten. I'm driving to work yesterday morning, talking on the cell to Brian. As I get closer to the business I notice a guy standing in the parking lot, a few feet behind a battered and bondoed sedan. He appeared to be administering a field sobriety test to himself--walking along the seams in the concrete, trying to maintain a straight line, arms held out straight from his sides.
I feel it's important to note he was wearing a white button down shirt and black shorts with a white hibiscus pattern, he also had socks pulled halfway up his calves.
~*~
People are offering to buy tomatoes from me. I find this sort of crazy when there's a great farmer's market here.
~*~Went out to work in the yard this afternoon and found another 3 foot long snake, crossing the patch. No clue what sort. Definitely not a black snake, although it is (errr was) a blackish-brownish color with a subtle diamond pattern. I fetched the machete and played Red Queen with it. Apparently there are a lot of snakes this summer...huzzah. I found myself wishing my grandfather was still alive--he'd have known what it was. I just hope I don't run across a copperhead. Oy god. I'll scream like a girl. Might even tinkle a little.
2 comments:
Do you have a creek nearby? If so it's probably a banded water snake, which look VERY MUCH like copperheads, except for the head shapes (copperheads have an arrow shaped head--or so I've been told). Banded water snakes will thrive on land, but they much prefer to be very close to a creek/pond. They might bite but aren't poisonous, and they will eat a ton of mosquitoes and other pest, which is well worth the frisson of fear that travels up to my brainstem whenever I see one within a few feet of my feet.
Pamela--I think you nailed it! The hideous neighbors have a couple of ponds very close to the property. I think there's also a "creek" that runs through the lower part of their field (it's really more of a glorified ditch but does fill up and run when there's rain.)
I feel bad now. No more killing those.
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