perfidy

Ha ha that title ought to pull in some perv traffic from Google.

But no really, I saw a big snake today. I'm out with the Li'lest Lethal who, while strictly speaking is no longer sick, he can't go back to school until he's 24 hours fever-free. Since he's feeling himself and it's a gorgeous day out, and he's been up since 5 waiting to do something, around 10 I took him to a nearby conservation area a coupla towns over.

Now Johno and Mrs. Johno suffered one portion of that property, a largish hill (elev ~1250 ft) that we made them ascend one hot and stuffy summer day. You might have thought that when we got to the top, where a chill rain was feeding the blustery wind tearing at the bald top of the hill it might have been a little relief from the relentless sun and heat, but no not really. Just cold. And wet. Oh, and I made Johno pull a Radio Flyer about halfway up too, over the rockiest, most jagged bits.

Where was I going with this?

Oh right, I said that next time we'll do a circuit of the pond about a mile away from the hill. It's easy, no surprisingly miserable local weather patterns, and it's all very Thoreau-ly pleasant. Ha. Ha. Ha.

'Cept for the snakes.

To be fair, it didn't try to bite myself or my boy. We were well off the trail, skirting the edge of the pond. We were gently and cautiously squelching our way along the moss and plants where the water just starts to creep up the fairly steep and rocky slope that describes the whole southern end of the pond.

We had already spooked a few big frogs who had hurled themselves into the water with a screeching "meep!" at our approach, but the Lesser Lethal hadn't actually seen them. I wanted him to see some though, so we kept going. It didn't help that, being not yet 3 years old, my boy finds it impossible to stay silent for more than 3 or 4 consecutive seconds.

When there was a burst of motion from the clump of fern immediately to my right; a bit of black lightning shot from it, straight across where I was about to step, and into the water: thrush rush splash.

From what I could see it was black all down its length, roughly 30", and probably no thicker than half my wrist. And that's about all I got from the encounter. Oh, and that it was frigging fast. Made no effort to warn or fight; went straight into escape mode, and apparently safety to this snake means getting in the water.

I'm thinking it was a Black Racer:

or a Black Rat Snake:

[wik] And I think it goes without saying that, had that been a zombie, we'd'a both been dead. Eh, undead. I'm trying to treat it as a lesson learned, but am still feeling like I failed. Gotta be way more alert and aware than that when the zombies come.