Bama Creatures

Where do I live again? I mean, I grew up in Florida land of the wild and home of two of the most scary animals in the world: Alligators and Sharks! Both of which I am deathly afraid, but never have had a personal encounter with. So of the 6 years I have lived in Alabama I have never had any issues with any animal other than the usual mosquitoes. That is until the past week and a half…

1st Encounter: At the end of last week I was taking the trash out from our garage and as I was reaching for something I spotted a HUGE black spider with a bright red hour glass on its belly, a freaking BLACK WIDOW! So naturally I freak out, and of course of all times this could happen Tyler is at work. Knowing I have to kill it so that it doesn’t bite any of us, I grab a 5ft long floor scrubbing brush (the first thing I could find that would keep me as far away from the spider as possible). After a few minutes of chasing the spider up and down and all around Ty’s tools, the feat was mine, one dead black widow!

2nd Encounter: This was probably the least scary of the three but still. On my way home from work last night I am driving, talking to my mom on the phone, and as I turn down the country road that leads back to our neighborhood I see this animal on the side of the road, alive looking out waiting to cross. It is not your usual dog or deer, but meaner and scarier looking, I swear it was either a wolf or a coyote (after some internet research, I learned both live here!) So I am trying to explain this scary animal to my mom, whom I am still talking to on the phone when at last I had my third encounter……

3rd Encounter: So as I pull into my neighborhood that same night, I am driving up the little hill and at the top I see this huge squiggly thing laying in the middle of the road, as I get closer I see that it is a very large snake. I hate snakes, all kinds of snakes, doesn’t matter the size, I hate all of them. So as I drive by this snake I rolled down the window to get a closer look and guess what I see…..rattles! This was a freakin RATTLE SNAKE! Complete with the markings and triangle head. So in the midst of my freak out, I ask my mom what I should do, she says run it over! Run it over! I knew I had to kill it, because I was so worried that it would someday show up and bite one of my dogs or a person or kid for that matter but I just couldn’t comprehend running it over , so I decided to call Tyler to see what he says I should do. His advice was to run it over as well, so I muster up the courage to run this big snake over and spatter its guts all over the road. Gross. Once it was dead, Ty finally got home and cleaned it up out of the street, saying it weight at least 12-15 lbs. I now am kind of proud of myself for killing a 15 lb. deadly rattlesnake, and I get to remember that night every time I pull in the neighborhood and can see the acid stain of the snake guts splattered in the road….just call me the snake wrangler!

~ ajL