It keeps me awake at night.

(The only snake I want to see.  A commissioned ring.)

The other day my husband said the neighbor stopped by and told him there was a big black snake crossing the road (with eggs..... what ever that means) behind our house.

We've lived in our house for over thirty years and in all that time I've only seen a snake twice.  (That's two times too many in my book!)

The first time my husband had just left for a weeklong fishing trip and I was getting ready to head out the door for a full week of shopping,  eating what I wanted and having the TV all to myself.   As I headed out the door I saw this long black snake heading up the driveway toward the house.  There was about an inch crack under the garage door and I envisioned him slipping right under the door so I stuffed something in there to close up the gap.  He just laid out there in the driveway (a barrier to me and my freedom.  Would he lay there for the full seven days?)   I called my neighbor and asked him if he was afraid of snakes.  "No........(long pause here)..... Why?  I told him what I wanted and he said he would be over to take care of it.  He showed up with a copper pipe (about eight feet long) and something else that I can't remember.  (I'm not sure he really wanted to do this.)  He really didn't have to do anything as the snake slivered away as soon as he saw him.

Now I lay awake at night.  Is the snake under my back porch where the amount of weeds growing around it would help him hide?  (I want to pull those weeds and plant mums but now I'm not sure.)

Or...... is he hiding in the ceiling of the garage (where my husband installed a dropped ceiling and I know there is some kind of critter up there.)  I use to think it was a chipmunk but now I'm beginning to wonder.

What keeps me up at night is seeing Zoe Nelson's picture of a black snake climbing the wall of her shed.   There is no reason why a snake couldn't climb the block wall of the garage and crawl into the garage.  Tomorrow I'll tell you about the second encounter I had with a black snake "in my garage."  (At least he was on the floor!)

I would never hurt a snake.  (I try not to hurt any living creature..... except ants when they come into my house.  I am not going to catch an ant in a jar and release him outdoors.)  But, I don't want to come face to face with a snake  either (just stay your distance and we will be okay.  Let me rephrase that..... I will be okay.)

Remind me sometime to tell you about the Boa constrictor that lived at our house for awhile before it headed off to my husband's classroom.  And the "what ever made me think I could feed a dead mouse to a six foot boa" story.