cellini's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Loveliness of Spring So last night I was in the kitchen, brewing beer when Ida walks in. She goes over to the sink for some reason and accidentally planted one bare foot into the dogs' water bowl, which was not in it's usual place. Water splashes all over the floor. "Ok, what are you doing over there in the first place? Can I get you something?" I asked. Ida paused for a moment before saying "I'm just looking for some water to step my feet into." With a perfectly straight face, she put her other foot in the water. ______________________________________ It's spring. Says me, anyhow. The red maple in front of my house is starting to bud. Birds are nesting and singing and all the rest. That pair of birds that nested on the front porch last year is back. They've been renovating the old nest a bit. Building it up a little higher. I am regretting not having removed the nest during the winter. Too late now. It would be a rotten thing for me to kick them out at this point. I should have gotten rid of it during the winter and put a triangular piece of wood in it's place, which would have prevented another nest from being built on the site. That whole drama with the snakes last spring and summer is not something that I am looking forward to repeating. A nest full of baby birds will attract snakes, meaning that I'll be dealing with enormous fucking snakes on the front porch all summer with a 4 year old and a toddler playing on it. I do not like killing snakes. Or capturing them or dealing with them in any capacity. However, I now have a much better idea of how to kill a snake in an awkward place. Last year I used all sorts of different guns with varying results. I popped the first one with my .38 revolver while it was braced into the window frame in striking position beside the front door. Literally, I walked up to the front door, Trish was there in the doorway to greet me with the baby in her arms and I saw this huge fucking snake with it's head about 8 inches from her face. I shoved her inside, slammed the door (God knows what she thought was happening) and pulled my .38 from my briefcase. That didn't work so well for reasons that I won't elaborate on at the moment. Suffice to say that I had to shoot that fucker something like 4 times until it agreed that it was dead. Then I got 2 more at one go the following weekend under similarly harrowing conditions, although that time I used a 20 gauge shotgun. The 20 gauge full of number 8 bird shot does the job very quickly indeed. However, the 'splatter effect' added a whole new level of fucked-up-ness that my day did not need at that point. Just *try* getting snake's blood out of white cotton. Wash in cold water with detergent immediately. In case anyone was wondering. It was when the 4 footer appeared under the bookshelf in the living room the morning of Ida's Halloween party that I finally found the right tool for the job. It was only about 30 minutes before something like a dozen 3 and 4 year olds and their parents were due to show up. A reasonably large snake in the living room was not an acceptable element of the celebration, Halloween or no. I tried prying the bastard out with a stick but he wasn't having it. Time being of the essence, I gave up all hope of capturing him alive. Blasting a great big hole through the floor with a shotgun was not an option I liked. I've shot rats inside with a .22 pistol before, but never in a spot where the bullet hole would be visible. That was when I remember my little box of .22 shotshells. They turn your .22 rifle or pistol into a teensy little shotgun. Very little penetration, but then a snake's brain or other vitals are only less than a half inch from the surface of it's skin anyhow. I loaded a single shell into a rifle. pointed the muzzle about 6 inches away from my target and finished my visitor off with one shot. And the remarkable thing was that there was not so much as a scratch on the floor. The shot went deep enough to kill the snake but stopped before going into the floor. Perfect! So that is my personal suggestion for killing big, nasty snakes in awkward places. A .22 shotshell in a rifle. A rifle barrel is long enough that you can get the muzzle right in there without having to worry about your hand getting bit. Very little mess, not much noise, no unseemly bullet holes and no splattery snake bits decorating your person. How the hell did this turn into an entry about the best way to shoot snakes in one's house? It was fully my intention to write about the loveliness of spring, I swear. 10:58 - 2008-03-03 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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