Last Saturday, my neighbor came over to visit on his poorly running `02 Star 650. He's an interesting fellow, has a 20 acre mini ranch next to mine, came from old Mexico, claims direct decendantcy to Geronimo on his father's side. His claim is quite believable after he's polished off a bottle of Tequila. He knows how to survive in the wilderness, taught me how to prepare/cook cactus, century plants, goats (underground roast), but is very superstitious about certain animals and sounds in the night. His visit was more than cordial, invited me to his place for the day, but I knew he wanted me to fix his bike. Grabbed some tools and carb cleaner, went over to his place. Several of his friends and family were there, usual weekend gathering for mexican bar-b-que and such.
After some visiting and relaxing, we grabbed the tools, and I started walking over to his bike. "No, no, not that one. The other one!" Huh? Another one? We walked down to one of the barns, chased out the livestock, and inside was another very dusty `02 Star 650. Front end was bent/crunched/twisted, he figured I could fix it in a couple of hours. I went through the motions of wiping off dust in various important-looking places, commenting on the severity of the damage, and after sufficient grunts and arm-waving, finally convinced him that this was a lot more than just a simple adjustment.
Stepped out for a smoke, thinking about his 'project', when something caught the corner of my eye. 50 feet off, in a brushpile, saw what looked like a 4-5" diameter twisted tree trunk, emerging from the brushpile and growing straight up to about 3 feet tall. Never seen a tree suddenly grow like that. Then it retracted back into the pile. Walked over a little closer for a better look, and 'oh-crap'!
Called my friend over and pointed out his 'new' problem. His vision is not so good, couldn't quite make it out. Pointed right at the area of the pile and the 'tree' emerged again as I said 'SNAKE'! He jumped back, ran off and retrieved a single-shot 12 guage, before I could tell him that this was TWO snakes doing their twisted-love thing. He tossed me the shotgun and scampered back to the fence yelling 'shoot it, shoot it!' Oh great, got one cartridge, one barrel, better make it good.
The shot nearly cut both of them in half. He came back over, then realized there was two. He dragged them out to the open field, pair of 8 foot fatted chicken snakes. The rest of the crowd came over, followed by about 20 minutes of south-of-border chattering. Seems that he hadn't been able to gather eggs for the last 2-3 months, figured it was racoons.
The folks started calling me something that I can't pronounce, much less spell, loosly translates to: "One shot, Two snakes".
After some visiting and relaxing, we grabbed the tools, and I started walking over to his bike. "No, no, not that one. The other one!" Huh? Another one? We walked down to one of the barns, chased out the livestock, and inside was another very dusty `02 Star 650. Front end was bent/crunched/twisted, he figured I could fix it in a couple of hours. I went through the motions of wiping off dust in various important-looking places, commenting on the severity of the damage, and after sufficient grunts and arm-waving, finally convinced him that this was a lot more than just a simple adjustment.
Stepped out for a smoke, thinking about his 'project', when something caught the corner of my eye. 50 feet off, in a brushpile, saw what looked like a 4-5" diameter twisted tree trunk, emerging from the brushpile and growing straight up to about 3 feet tall. Never seen a tree suddenly grow like that. Then it retracted back into the pile. Walked over a little closer for a better look, and 'oh-crap'!
Called my friend over and pointed out his 'new' problem. His vision is not so good, couldn't quite make it out. Pointed right at the area of the pile and the 'tree' emerged again as I said 'SNAKE'! He jumped back, ran off and retrieved a single-shot 12 guage, before I could tell him that this was TWO snakes doing their twisted-love thing. He tossed me the shotgun and scampered back to the fence yelling 'shoot it, shoot it!' Oh great, got one cartridge, one barrel, better make it good.
The shot nearly cut both of them in half. He came back over, then realized there was two. He dragged them out to the open field, pair of 8 foot fatted chicken snakes. The rest of the crowd came over, followed by about 20 minutes of south-of-border chattering. Seems that he hadn't been able to gather eggs for the last 2-3 months, figured it was racoons.
The folks started calling me something that I can't pronounce, much less spell, loosly translates to: "One shot, Two snakes".
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