this is because it's sunday

The snake of a thousand evils returned yesterday morning while I innocently--and I do mean innocently--drank my coffee and contemplated healthy thoughts of Clark/Lex bondage and Supernatural season five (my son is rewatching) and Buffy season six (my sister is watching), and maybe I was praying too, so you see how I didn't deserve to stare at a snake draped over a flower stand less than eight feet away staring at me mockingly.

After achieving what may have been teleportation (I don't remember what happened but I was inside like really fast), I've come to the conclusion that snakes, like small children, cats, and dogs, are most attracted to those that hate and fear them, which is why I win for most snake sighting ever in my family. I'm not actually kidding here.

From specific traumatic moments to general
1.) Rattlesnake hanging from roof - me
2.) Rattlesnake sleeping in drawer - me
3.) Rattlesnake on porch in staring match with cat - me
4.) Rattlesnake pursing me and Lindy across the front yard - me
5.) Huge mating ball of water moccasins over side of low bridge holy fuck nightmare fuel to this day - me
6.) Garter snake that looked like shoelace - me
7.) Snake in front yard, leaped onto folding chair with girlish scream - me
8.) Snakes in tank behind house in the country - MANY TIMES
9.) GODDAMN BLOTCHED WATER SNAKE - TWO TIMES NOW
10.) Rattlesnakes in general - LIKE A LOT
11.) Snakes in lake behind house in the country - MY CHILDHOOD LIKE A LOT

I'm not counting every time I have to go to the reptile pet stores because I try to repress those memories. I just learned there that reptiles have a smell and I react to it much like any animal and want to cry and hide in the bunny pit.

This is the funny thing; like claustrophobia, snake fear was something that developed rapidly and with no actual defining event that hit me during puberty. I know this is starting to sound like repressed memory where it ends up I recall being the virgin sacrifice during a satanistic orgy at daycare or something and EXPLANATION (maybe it involved being placed in a coffin during the proceedings?) but no one remembers this now--I liked snakes. I wanted one as a kid. I wanted specifically a python, because during the competitive summer reading program at the library someone brought a giant awesome python (to encourage reading?) and I fell in love.

I do not believe I'm repressing a satanistic orgy memory or anything, but I also think Snakes on a Plane's most terrifying possible sequel would be Snakes in An Elevator In The Tallest Building in the World With No Air Conditioning. Just knowing it appeared in theatres would assure I never left my bedroom again. In my life.

Life

Oddly enough, two people have been converted to The Wonder and Bank Account Destruction that is Keurig. Ever since I got my first one, I never looked back, and I routinely stare hungrily at newer models with more water capacity and more buttons. My sister and a coworker both just fell madly, deeply, and financially destructively in love, and so I ruthlessly ordered more coffee from Amazon just to give them samples and watch as they, like me, lose any hope of keeping a savings account when they taste:
1.) Gloria Jean's Macadamia Cookie
2.) Gloria Jean's Mudslide
3.) Donut House Chocolate Glazed Donut
4.) Donut House Light Roast
5.) Green Mountain Nantucket Blend

They will sell their souls at 59 to 81 cents a pod. This is joy.

Comments

[nagasvoice]

I'm wondering now if there's something about your property, or places where you go (like lakes etc.) that is rodent-friendly, which encourages reptiles setting up house nearby? For instance, folks in this area allow bushes to grow right up near the house foundation, and I understand folks in places in the Southeast would never, ever allow this, as being too dangerous in what it gives cover for. We aren't too worried about leaving brush piles sitting for awhile either, which would also be a problem for folks in other areas.
We do have rattlers, but they're out in the country, not common in ordinary urban sites. We tend to have feral cats working on the rodents instead.

[seperis]

We have no grass--the yard is not that big, but the only tree is huge, which is good because it keeps AC costs down, but we do have a runoff behind our house--it's stretches not just the entire neighborhood, but miles in either direction past our neighborhood--so water snakes I guess get here with that.

[azurelunatic]

That's a lot of unwanted snaketime.

[ladyvyola]

That sounds like the worst timeshare ever.

[azurelunatic]

At work, a friend of mine and I have started to use "snakes" like Ivan, but more for software bugs than intergalactic diplomatic incidents.

[seperis]

IDGI either. Like, why. I don't think they feed on terror and panic. OR SO I ONCE THOUGHT.

[blueraccoon]

The Keurig thing is so awesome. We had friends who had one. Then other friends got one. Then we got one. Then my parents got one. Then my in-laws got one, and so on and so forth. We actually upgraded from the original model we bought at Costco to the Cuisinart model because our original wasn't working properly, and I love it because it's so much *quieter*.

[seperis]

THIS SO MUCH. I love my Keurig. It speaks to me. In coffee.

[synecdochic]

Were you kidnapped as a Goa'uld as a teenager? :D

[seperis]

...suddenly my love of Stargate makes sense.

[lilacsigil]

It's the same in my house with spiders - I actually like spiders, so I hardly ever see any, but my partner is scared of them (less than she used to be) so she sees them all the time.

Do you differentiate between pythons and other snakes? I'm not scared of pythons, but I am extremely scared of other snakes that might be poisonous and kill me.

[seperis]

I wonder about that. I don't have the same run reaction, but to be fair, I've never seen one approaching in the wild. I'm going to guess that it wouldn't end well for anyone, or rather, me, and specifically, my entire nervous system.