That's Okay Mark, It's Not Poisonous.

I think our iguana problem has abated for at least this year, if not for a few years. The extremely cold winter weather we had seems to have killed over ninety percent of the little green bastards, and so far here in the heat of summer (yes it's summer here already, no matter what the calendar says) I haven't seen evidence of a single iguana. That might be why Mark's tomato garden is producing fruit faster than we can eat them. No iguanas to destroy them. On the rat front though, it's a different story. late every night, in the silence, I can hear their little feet scampering around in the attic. I would put more poison up there, but I just don't want to go through that stench of dead rodent again. At least not for a while.

Just when I thought I was totally up to speed on all the pests and beasts that Florida has to offer, I came across the following headline on the Sun-Sentinel web site. "Boynton Beach woman finds deadly coral snake in swimming pool!" That is scary shit. I have a pool, I find things in it all the time. But wait, is this just some kind of weird pet that some tattooed butt-hole has let get loose from the herpetarium he keeps in his mobile home? So I read a little further, “The bite of a full grown coral snake can kill an elephant.” Whoa, that sounds pretty serious, but it still didn’t answer my question. Do I have anything to worry about? Upon further reading I had my answer, “Coral snakes are native to Florida......   Son of a bitch! I have lived here twenty one years, and I never knew I had to keep an eye out for snakes with red, black, and yellow bands. I spend quite a bit of time out in that yard, digging around in the weeds that I call ground cover. I always hear things skittering away in the under growth, and never think much of it. Must be lizards is what I figure. There is only one answer to this development. Encourage Mark to do more of the gardening, and I’ll pick up the slack in the kitchen. Even if Mark doesn’t get bitten, at least with me cooking I know that I will lose weight. I can’t cook for shit. Instead of snake bite, we’ll starve to death.