Snake in the...Office?

We had some excitement at my office the other day. You'll remember we recently moved to a new location. An out of the way location. A location surrounded by vacant fields of amber waving grain (okay, it's just hay but...). This is nothing new for me as I'm always surrounded by green fields. I encounter critters on a fairly common basis and have simply learned to live with them. They stay in their space, I'll stay in mine and we'll both live happily ever after.

Someone forgot to tell the snake. I walked into the office recently, plopped my stuff on my desk, turned around and noticed one of the glue traps our pest control guy had left was moved. And it appeared to have a big caterpillar in it... OMG! That it wasn't a caterpillar. It was a snake, head stuck in glue, body wrapped tight around the little box and tail curled around the sides.

According to my boss (and I have to take his word for it because I don't recall) I crept back to his office and whispered, "Is that a snake in the front of the office?" as if the thing might hear me and give chase. He was completely flabbergasted by what I was saying and promptly followed me back to my area (Oh yes, it was in MY area) to have a look. Sure enough, snake.

Here might be a good place to pause and explain that thanks to a traumatic childhood incident involving my little sister and some Benadryl I have a humongous fear of snakes. But it was tiny and stuck so I called the pest control guys, informed our neighbors so they'd be aware of our little problem, and several of us stared at the thing for no less than an hour. It did not move. It was pronounced dead. Until everyone went back to their respective corners to attempt to work some more. I called Smart Pants - who had called me earlier to heckle the 'snake killer' - and was spending a few minutes coming down off my snake high.

Then the thing moved. And I screamed in her ear. And apparently (again taking their word for it) repeated over and over, "It's moving. It's moving!" in a high pitched, squealing voice. My boss came running with a pair of pliers, grabbed up the glue box and stuck it outside...while I held open the door.

Zilla stopped by, because he is my resident animal expert and when encountered by something I don't like I immediately call him. That is what wonderful husbands are for. They kill spiders and vamoose snakes. He agreed that to try and get it off of the glue trap would kill it. We decided to wait until the pest control guy arrived.

Forty-five minutes later, he shows up. Looks at the thing and then tells us that he'll take it over to the field and try to get it off of the glue...with frosting. My first thought was that was a waste of good frosting. Apparently, oil or Crisco would have worked but he didn't have any of those and frosting usually contains Crisco.

I have no idea whether the snake was released successfully or not...as long as he stays on his side of the office door from now on I really don't care.

The moral of this story? No matter what happens on the Playground, it will always come back to buttercream.

Any encounters with wildlife you'd like to share? Do you have a fear that you've been forced to face head on?

Instigator

P.S. As an update to this blog...yesterday we found another baby snake stuck in a glue trap AT MY FEET. I think I'm officially boycotting the office until the snakes are gone. I do not like the fact that they only seem to infiltrate my area. This is 2 snakes in 2 weeks. That is 2 too many!!