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- Aug 8, 2005
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Ret. On the way home from dinner last night. About 12 foot.
Gorgeous retic. Absolutely gorgeous.Ret. On the way home from dinner last night. About 12 foot.
It'll have probably been taking advantage of the residual heat from the road. I used to have a couple of retics. Fantastic snakes.This was one of those moments where your life turns into a silly sitcom. The boss is at the wheel so my brain was divided into several functions. How much metal shaving are drifting to the bottom of the tranny from her anti synchromesh destruction fest, how to get the ride towed out of a rice paddy that late in the evening if she takes it off the road in the wrong place like where we were right then, how long it will take to get home traveling at approximately 7 furlongs per fortnight and so on.
She announces SNAKE as she tests the brand new brakes and the locking mechanism of my seat belt retractor. I look around to the side of the vehicle. The frog corps. is out in force doing the amphibian in the headlights thing so I'm looking about for a juvy Hannah itching to tag me if I set my sandal armored foot on the ground.
Me: Where?
Her: THERE! PYTHON!!
My brain hotel filters this new information. The desk clerk mutters my way, 'Think larger. Big.' My eyes scan up the road a little and WHOA! Lovely. Reptilian orgasmic delicious.
Me: Get a picture!
Of course we don't have our spiffy new takes shots in total darkness Nikon. Just her smell phone. Getting her to just find any function besides Farcebarf on it usually requires 5 to 10 minutes but maybe just this once.....
Her: I'm driving!!
Me: Yes? So? It's not like that is all you are going to be doing for the rest of your life. We are already stopped. Find neutral, pull parking brake, grab smell phone.
Her: It's in back!!!
She is really really really really really really good at making excuses and rationalizing. Anything but the horror of horrors, cramming yourself in granny and getting with the program at hand. She wouldn't last long in rattlesnake country. I reach back, grab the Quantum Anomally, a personal black hole aka her purse and plop it on her lap. Deciding to expedite things, shave a half hour off the pre launch count down I find neutral for her and pull the parking brake.
She finds her phone. ... She gets out. ... ......................
Her: It's too dark! Back the car up.
For a person who can snatch flying Huntsman out of the air .... this could have been done by you about 1 1/2 seconds after you brought our movie to a halt. But no, I have to climb over the console and shifter, squeeze under the steering wheel, get teeth marks in my kneecaps thanks to her aerial view of a human being's preferred seat adjustments, and back it up. Then she finally kicks the old mule into go and the video attests to her gooeyness when it comes to critters.
I wanted it the heck off the road and out of danger. I went up and firmly grabbed it's tail. It took off like a rocket. Of course she had stopped taking the vid just before then.
Here is a bonus for all. Freeing captive Ptyas- making merit. (Also a fantastic way to cut down on the local rodent population)
Possible but considering the species unlikely. Rets aren't thermally motivated as much as many predator snakes but are nearly always in ambush mode. Considering it's proximity to the verge and the speed when it took off, it was hunting. The verges are up to their eyeballs in frogs and predators of the frogs in the evening and these folks are definitely in the 'anything that moves is edible' mindset.It'll have probably been taking advantage of the residual heat from the road.