Squeaks, Squeals, and Slithers

It was mid-afternoon and they had just finished eating a late lunch - The Steward took a grimy Little Boy to take a bath while Wife cleaned up in the kitchen. As she was walking past the pantry door on the way to deposit a soiled dishcloth in the washroom, she thought she saw something dark flash in the corner of her eye. 

A mouse at this time of day? What is my house coming to?! 

She turned around sharply to apprehend the cretin that has been plaguing the Little House, and upon throwing the pantry door wide open, came face to face with a rather large snake.

"EEEKKK!!! HUSBAND!!!" she cried and leapt back, keeping her eyes fixed on the completely unexpected guest as it wound deeper into the cans of V8 and boxes of ziplock baggies. It shook its tail and Wife trembled, lest it be poisonous. Husband rounded the corner, mouth full of toothpaste, toothbrush in hand, to investigate. 

"Mmmm!" said the man with his mouth full, obvious interest lighting up his his face. Handing his toothbrush to Wife he peers into the recesses of the pantry shelf.

"Wash 'im wal I spi," he says, and leaves Wife to huff through a stress-induced Braxton-Hicks contraction while staring at the shelf above and below, making sure the snake doesn't disappear. It has hidden itself in the contents of the middle shelf. A moment later the Steward reappears. 

"Black snake?" asks Wife.

"Yes." 

"I saw it shake it's tail - can black snakes do that?"

"It's because you scared it." He is busy trying to figure out the best way to get the snake out. He gets his baton out of his deputy belt and starts pulling things off the shelf. Wife goes to watch the Little Boy who has had his bath water shut off and still wants his bath. Papa has better things to do!

"I want to see it when you catch it!" she calls from the bathroom. She washes the Boy and supervises his bubbly bath, waiting for Husband to complete the capture of the snake. Finally she hears the warning:

"Wife, don't freak out, I've got the snake," he calls as he comes around the corner. "It's bigger than I thought." He gently stretches it out and measures - perhaps 3 feet long and at least an inch around at the widest. The Steward calls Boromir to ask him to take the snake down the road and let it go far enough away that it can't find its way back to the pantry. The Steward doesn't mind black snakes, but he doesn't like them in his house. He says they are just as messy as mice in terms of excrement, only a snake's is bigger and more copious. Lovely, thinks Wife. But at least a snake won't chew up the felt in my piano or my scrapbook papers! She doesn't mind black snakes, either, only she doesn't wish to find them in her pantry, especially when she was expecting a tiny beady-eyed little mouse. 

Still on the hunt for those meeses. They leave their poo offerings everywhere and have become quite a nuisance! Short of poison, we've tried everything: v-traps, springboard traps, glue boards. Now it's gotten so that the local black snakes can smell them out - they're like a snake-siren, calling all black snakes to come and eat them....in the Dining Hall of the Little House. My house! The new house is not ready yet  - so the mice must be dealt with. The game stats are fairly gloomy: mice have been winning so far. If only I could catch just one! Perhaps it would lower their morale...it would certainly boost mine! :)