Buster’s Blog

Thought you might like to see that there is some progress being made on getting the log cabin ready.

Marilyn, Buster and I were out for a short walk around the side yard with Buster on a leash and he was well behaved.  As we returned to the front yard, Buster stopped to mark a small tree but he really isn’t a very good shot.  Actually, I think he must have been voiding since he sensed that we were at the end of the walk.  Anyway, Marilyn didn’t see what he was doing and walked on the other side of the tree to get by us and caught the full stream on her open toed shoes and her pants.  I would have rolled on the ground laughing except it would have been hazardous to my health.  She washed her shoes with 409 and sent her pants, which are washable, to the cleaners.  Even she thought it was funny after the initial shock.  Buster, of course, was oblivious to the whole thing.

The waterproofers came today and sprayed some black gunk on the concrete blocks and put some foam boards over it I guess to keep rocks from scratching through the tar.  They put a new kind of drain at the bottom that replaces a preferated pipe and gravel.  This stuff is only about an inch thick but is about a foot or so high and collects any water that makes it down to it.

Some carpenters started working on the family room to connect the two halves.  Also they are going to swap where the outside door is with the windows so that the steps in the back (there were two and now there will be a lot more than two) will go toward the garage. A picture would save a lot of words here except there isn’t anything to take a picture of yet.

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It has been a while since I’ve done a damage report and that is a good thing. I let Buster run free on Wednesday and he was content to stay in his doghouse instead of coming in the utility room when I got home from the Wednesday Night Picking so I just let him stay out there thinking that I wouldn’t have to get up early to walk him. When Marilyn left for work she found him running behind a truck coming to work on the log cabin (so he must have been up toward the road or the Chickens or something) but he decided to follow her instead of the truck. She tried to turn around in the little “scenic overlook”? but the preacher came by and she had to go on up to the head of the driveway and turn around. Naturally Buster followed her all the way up and back. She put him on the tether and instructed me to never let him off of it again. This morning she noticed the well house had been more or less destroyed. It is all circumstantial evidence that Buster is responsible for this. He can’t get to the well house when he is on his tether and that is probably why he hasn’t done this before.

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Marilyn called me on my cell phone from her cell phone while she was on the front porch with a very excited pitch to her voice telling me to get up there at once and to come out the front door (as opposed to the kitchen door where this snake is). She may have told me why she wanted me right then, but I could tell by the tone of her voice that it didn’t matter why.

Fortunately this is a non-poisonous snake so I caught it. The reason I was able to catch it is probably because it was kind of chilly and the snake was slow.

So now I’m holding a snake behind its head with my right hand.

What do I do next?

My inclination was to take him/her/it out in the woods away from the house and let it go.

That was not the majority opinion.

We had some 5 gallon buckets but we didn’t have lids for them so we put the snake in a black plastic garbage sack and fastened the top shut with a rubber band and put the sack in a bucket and put the bucket in the front seat of my car.

We then went off in Marilyn’s car to a Mexican restaurant. I was going to the Wednesday Night Picking so the plan was for me to take the snake across the river and let it go near the dam.

When I started my car I noticed that the snake was on the dashboard instead of in the plastic sack. That gave me a start as you may imagine. Before I could turn off the engine and grab the snake, half or so of it had made its way through a small hole to under the dashboard. I was able to grab it before it completely disappeared, but there was no pulling it back out. I was at a very awkward angle and my back was beginning to hurt when Steve finally agreed to hold onto the snake while I got out and came around the car to get a better grip. He had to use the plastic garbage sack to hold onto the snake because he just couldn’t stand the thought of touching the snake with his bare hands.

After about what seemed like half an hour but was probably more like 10 or 15 minutes the snake began to weaken and I was able to pull it out. Meanwhile Steve got a cake safe and we put the snake in the cake safe and latched it shut. I took it across the dam and let it go in a freshly mowed field near the TVA power center and it slithered away becoming a true snake in the grass.