Not in the way that I hate other things, like Starburst candy, or clothes that got left in the dryer and wrinkled, or my ex-husband.
There is nothing I hate the way I hate snakes. I even hate the word "snake." I get nauseous every time I hear it. There are no words to describe the level of my snake hatred-- Indiana Jones would have cuddled in a cage with cobras compared to me. When I'm super stressed out (which is about 93% of the time because I'm genetically pre-disposed to stress) I have nightmares on loop about snakes. Big snakes. Small snakes. ALL THE SNAKES.
In June of 2008, when we moved into our home in Suffolk, Virginia, I looked up from the living room where I was unpacking a box and talking on the phone to my Mom and there was a snake crawling through my kitchen. I guess it had sneaked in when the movers had the door propped open all day to bring in furniture. I nearly had a heart attack. B killed the snake.
Two years later, I answered my phone to a friend yelling, "Don't open your front door!" Turns out, she was coming to visit and there was a big old snake curled up on the metal door stoop. I called a neighbor guy, who refused to help (fellow Ophidiophobian, apparently). So I called B at work, and he came home and killed the snake.
Fast forward to today.
We have lived in Georgia since December of 2014. Although some pre-move-to-GA Internet research led me to believe that we were possibly moving to one of the Snake Capitals of the USA, I was pleasantly surprised to find that in 3 1/2 years, I have not seen a single living snake. I've seen squished dead snakes in the road when I go running. But I've never seen any alive snakes, and particularly never any alive snakes in my yard. After so many near-death snake experiences in Virginia, I have seen the lack of snake-sitings as a very positive attribute of Georgia.
Well. Turns out my fucking no-snake winning streak is over.
Tonight, B and I were sitting on the screened-in porch talking when the dogs started freaking out in the backyard, about thirty feet away from us. Because it has been raining nonstop for two weeks, the grass had gotten about ankle high, but we could see that there was something brown-ish that they were barking at. There are lots of turtles around here, and I just figured it was a big turtle that had found its way through the fence somehow.
It was not a turtle. It was a big fucking snake. One of those extra-creepy, thick, potentially-poisonous motherfuckers.
Chaos ensued.
I wanted to shoot the snake with my .38. Once I started waving it around and cursing, B expressed that he felt that this was a bad plan, and made me get a shovel instead. (Hey neighbors-- if you ever hear a gunshot from my house, it's because I found another snake and B wasn't home because I will shoot that motherfucker in a heartbeat.) I felt like the shovel was a bad plan, so I got the shovel AND the pick-axe, AND a double martini.
While I drank on the porch and shouted encouragement, B went toe-to-toe with the snake, who at one point reared up and tried to eat him alive. I was on the porch screaming. Bells was in the kitchen, looking out the window, screaming. Sutton was screaming at us, wanting to know why we were screaming. The dogs were running in circles and barking at all of us. Welcome to my family.
Eventually, B was able to kill the snake, although I'm pretty sure it took a lot longer and a lot more effort than it would have taken me with the gun. Bells and I refuse to go outside now, because we're afraid we'll see another snake. I've been having snake nightmares for days, and apparently last night Bells had one too.
Guess it's time to move again. Anybody know anything about Maine?
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