All right. Where were we?

LawDog · September 10, 2001, 03:22 AM

When last we left, Mom was sitting in a chair with an enraged African Pygmy Mongoose in her lap, Tom was standing on the wet bar, Ali Cheap-Cheap was trying to get someone to pay him for 15 feet of perturbed python lurking under the furniture and Dad was...well, contemplating.

http://www.thefiringline.com/forums/...threadid=46895

*ahem*

Does anybody know how big a fifteen-foot python is?

I can hear the chorus now: "It's fifteen feet!" Yes, but do you realize how big around a fifteen-foot python is? It's bloody huge.

My brother and I had been attracted by the up-roar and, as boy-children will, immediately converged on the snakey parts sticking out from under the Chest.

Dad murmured, "Watch the sharp end, boys" as he pushed the chest out from against the wall, then knelt down and peered under it from the back side. Upon seeing something, Dad promptly slid his arm under the chest and began to feel around.

Squeaks, fed up with the wait-service, banzai-ed off Mom's lap, hit the floor and in one bounce shot under the chest, shrieking a tremendous mongoose war-cry as he disappeared: "Hah! Feel my wrath! Here is your doom! Prepare to be devoured!"

One of Dad's eyebrows kind of slid up, and he pulled his right arm out from under the Chest, revealing Squeaks clinging to it with all four sets of claws whilst delivering the dreaded Mongoose Death Bite(tm) to the back of Dad's wrist.

"Honey," said Dad, mildly, "Your rat isn't helping all that much."

"Are you sure you need the boys help?" inquired Mom, as she sat back in the chair, with Squeaks firmly anchored to her lap.

"Hmm?" mumbled Dad's voice from behind the Chest.

"Too right, Jim, old boy, I mean, that is a predator after all," chimed in Tom, helpfully.

The head of the python appeared over the top of the Chest, with one of Dad's hands clamped around its neck, "I've got the pointy end. Boys, see if you can find a tail on this thing."

Chris and I began to root about happily under the chest, and with the aid of a couple of Dad's walking stick collection, we pried the south end of the snake out from under the Chest.

"Dad, we found...oh, yuck."

Now, the Discovery Channel will tell you that, when disturbed, some species of snake will: "Secrete a noxious substance from their tails."

They lie.

Folks, I'm here to tell you that if a snake "secretes" that noxious substance, then a firehose "secretes" water. Got a hell of a range on it. Enough range, as a matter of fact, to reach out and paint a mother from her eyebrows down to the mongoose retching in her lap. And her with waist-length hair.

"Eep," said Chris, rather eloquently I thought, as Mom slowly scraped black/green grease off her face with one taloned hand.

"Bad luck," murmured Tom.

Dad popped up like a prairie dog. "What?"

"Dad, it, uh, sprayed..."

"Did any of it get on you?"

"Ah, hmm. On us? No, but, umm..."

"Good, good. Don't let the hind end get back under the Chest. Ali, come here."

Ali Cheap-Cheap, who had been watching all of this with intense fascination, jumped and pointed to his torso, "Boss?"

"Yes, you," One of Dad's hands reached out and got Ali by the front of his dashiki and pulled him behind the Chest. "Hold this. When I tell you, I want you to drag this end towards the door. Boys, when I lift the Chest, drag the tail out from under, okay?"

"Uh, Boss?"

Dad got his fingers under the edge of the chest, puffed a couple of times, and then lifted what I swear to God was half-a-ton of hand-carved teakwood.

"All right, pull."

"Boss, you say 'pull', nah beef, he say 'no'."

"Pull the snake, Ali."

"Boss."

"Bush man, I swear, if you don't..."

About this time, Mom levitated some three feet off her chair and, a bit like a Roman candle, exploded in a flaming mass of eyes, hair, grease and claws: "Pull the blankety-blank snake..."

...Ali took off like he'd been goosed with a cattle prod...

"...you blankety-blank son of a blankety..."

...Tom's eyebrows crawled up into his hairline as he regarded my rampaging mother...

"...blankety-blank mother of a blankety-blank goat..."

...Ali got to the end of the snake with approximately the same results as a running dog hitting the end of his chain, but he moved the snake about three feet...

"...Blankety-blank snake blankety-blank IN MY HAIR!"

Dad vaulted the Chest, grabbed the python in the middle and heaved him onto the front porch, where he bounced twice and skidded into the yard.

Watching the snake haul scales in the general direction of Port Harcourt, Dad sniffed reflectively, dusted off his hands, turned around and the first thing he saw was Mom.

"Honey," said Dad, somewhat bemusedly, "Why are you covered in grease?"

Mom glared at Dad, whipped around, and with Squeaks still firmly clenched in her hand stomped into the back of the house, muttering explosively and gesturing wildly. Crashing sounds drifted back.

"Redheads," opined the worldly-wise Tom.

Ali was practically dancing in rage, "Boss! Dis beef, fifty Niara!"

"Ali," murmured Dad, as he poured two glasses of Mr. Daniels finest, "You have gold?"

"Ah, Boss! I have gold necklace. A necklace such as only a princess could wear!"

"Seventy Niara."

"Oh, Boss! Seventy Niara is taking..."

"Trader man," Dad contemplated the bourbon, "Madame has gone for to fetch her machete."

"A blessing on your house, Boss." Ali traded the necklace for the money, bowed once and hot-footed it out the door.

Dad gathered up the necklace and both glasses of bourbon, and began wandering in the direction of the destructive noises emanating from the back of the house, "Bye, Tom. See you at the office tomorrow. Boys, go play. Stay away from anything with an appetite."

Et voila! The snake story.

LawDog

September 10, 2001, 03:59 AM

That was worth waiting for.

citizen · September 10, 2001, 05:12 AM

YES!!!!!!!!!

Thanks, LD.

Calamity Jane · September 10, 2001, 07:42 AM

<applause, applause>

Masterful, LawDog! Kudos for a story well-told!

buzz_knox · September 10, 2001, 07:51 AM

So much for getting anything constructive done today. I'm going to be sent for a fitness for duty exam because I'm cracking up here.

birdog4 · September 10, 2001, 09:29 AM

Great great story. that's what I like to hear about.....family fun!

**Marko Kloos** · September 10, 2001, 09:45 AM

Priceless. I love the mongoose bits...Squeaks seems to suffer from Yorkshire Terrier Disease, a psychological defect which makes the animal overestimate its own size by an exponential factor.

You really ought to consider a book of collected LawDog stories. It'd sell like Greenpeace stickers at a Green Party convention.

George Hill · September 10, 2001, 10:18 AM

Nice!

**Johnny Guest** · September 10, 2001, 10:52 AM

- - - Truly outstanding. Perhaps your best story yet.

You are a credit to the Regiment, Sir.

Johnny

**4V50 Gary** · September 10, 2001, 11:06 AM

By Gawd, that was good!

Thank you.

Gator · September 10, 2001, 11:33 AM

That was truly the most amazing story I've heard in years.

The mongoose translations were priceless.

Gator

TheBluesMan · September 10, 2001, 11:59 AM

Thanks LawDog!

Monkeyleg · September 10, 2001, 05:23 PM

Definitely worth waiting for! You're a 21st century Mark Twain.

Jim V · September 10, 2001, 05:29 PM

LawDog, I thank you, my friends will thank you and I have this strange desire to locate an African Pygmy Mongoose.

**Art Eatman** · September 10, 2001, 06:22 PM

JimV, some advice: Settle for a Yorky. A mongoose is sorta like a ferret with a really, really bad attitude.

, Art

Zander · September 10, 2001, 06:58 PM

Art, even a mongoose is snack food for a Jack Russell...the canine kingdom's equivalent of a scaled-down pit bull.

Jim V · September 10, 2001, 07:52 PM

In reality, I don't want any new critters around here.

If I got a mongoose, I'd have to get a snake just so LD could write up my adventures. LOL

OkieGentleman · September 10, 2001, 08:05 PM

Thank You!!

A good laugh!!! I think I would like to meet Lawmom some day!! A model lady if ever there was one.

C.R.Sam · September 10, 2001, 08:05 PM

Thanx Law Dawg.

Few who havent seen em up close realize how big those things are. Like Law Dawg saiz, it's not just the length.....a foot out of the middle would be huge.

Sam....been there, the stench is forever memorable.

Jim V · May 20, 2004, 08:17 PM

2nd half of the Mongoose v. Python story

gyp_c2 · May 21, 2004, 12:20 PM

Chipperman · May 21, 2004, 01:05 PM

Thanks. A long wait but well worth it.
I thought waiting for the next Harry Potter was bad.

-----
On a personal note, I occasionally work with large snakes. Here's a short snake sotry for you:

A couple of years ago a client came in the clinic door toting a larger Rubbermaid container on wheels. The Receptionists are always leery of any container that does not allow them to visibly identify the beasty contained therein. In this particular case, the container was the current domecile of a 12 year-old Reticulated Python.

Said snake was 18 feet long, and weighed 140 pounds. Needless to say, this snake was perfectly capable of killing an adult human without much effort. Well, the purpose of his visit was a sore in his mouth.

Hmmmmm....

OK, so I need to examine the mouth of an 18 foot long snake that weighs almost as much as I do. Time to round up a few technicians. Thankfully, the snake was pretty amicable about the whole examination process. One side of the mouth was horribly swollen, with necrotic tissue around the dental arced. Another Vet had been treating him for mouth rot for the past month, without any visible improvement. All right, time for Plan B. Told the owner that a biopsy was in order to determine what exactly was going on there.

I don't think he would have been very cooperative about me pulling chunks of oral mucosa out of his mouth for histopathology, so anesthesia would be needed. As this was late on a Saturday, it would have to wait until Monday. The owner lived about 2 hours away, so he elected to admit the snake for the weekend.

The debate then began about where to put this creature. The dog runs have gaps too large in them to keep a determined snake inside. The last thing we needed was to have Mrs. Pettibone arrive on Monday morning to reclaim her Poodle Ginger, and have us point to a small bulge in the middle of the snake's abdomen. The snake would have to be given his own room. Thankfully, our hospital was fairly large, and had two rooms specifically designed for Exotic animals. We emptied out one and put the snake inside. On the door, I placed a large sign that read: "DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT OPENING THIS DOOR UNLESS THERE AT LEAST TWO PEOPLE PRESENT"

I nodded to myself as I affixed the sign to the door, knowing that it may very well save the life of an employee. I went about seeing the rest of my appointments. Later that evening, the cleaning crew came in. Bob, who was very meticulous about mopping the floor, was not very cognizant about anything above it. Yeah, you know what's coming...

As I'm getting packed up to leave for the night, I suddenly hear a loud moaning "WHOOOOAAA",and the sound of cleaning implements scattering across a tile floor. Thinking Bob may have slipped on the wet floor, I ran around the corner to make sure he was alright. There he stood, with his back to the door, looking over at me. His face was alabaster, and his whole body was trembling. I tried my best to suppress a grin as I said, "So I see you met Godzilla."

He nodded slowly, and bent over to pick up his mop. Turning his back to me, he went about continuing his custodial duties without saying another word. He never mentioned it to anyone.

Monday came and we anesthetized the snake. I took a biopsy of his mouth and we got our answer. Unfortunately for Godzilla, it was Squamous Cell Carcinoma. He lived for about 6 more months.

September 10, 2001, 03:22 AM	#1
LawDog Staff Emeritus Join Date: September 15, 1999 Location: Where am I going? Why am I in this handbasket? Posts: 4,200	All right. Where were we? When last we left, Mom was sitting in a chair with an enraged African Pygmy Mongoose in her lap, Tom was standing on the wet bar, Ali Cheap-Cheap was trying to get someone to pay him for 15 feet of perturbed python lurking under the furniture and Dad was...well, contemplating. http://www.thefiringline.com/forums/...threadid=46895 ahem Does anybody know how big a fifteen-foot python is? I can hear the chorus now: "It's fifteen feet!" Yes, but do you realize how big around a fifteen-foot python is? It's bloody huge. My brother and I had been attracted by the up-roar and, as boy-children will, immediately converged on the snakey parts sticking out from under the Chest. Dad murmured, "Watch the sharp end, boys" as he pushed the chest out from against the wall, then knelt down and peered under it from the back side. Upon seeing something, Dad promptly slid his arm under the chest and began to feel around. Squeaks, fed up with the wait-service, banzai-ed off Mom's lap, hit the floor and in one bounce shot under the chest, shrieking a tremendous mongoose war-cry as he disappeared: "Hah! Feel my wrath! Here is your doom! Prepare to be devoured!" One of Dad's eyebrows kind of slid up, and he pulled his right arm out from under the Chest, revealing Squeaks clinging to it with all four sets of claws whilst delivering the dreaded Mongoose Death Bite(tm) to the back of Dad's wrist. "Honey," said Dad, mildly, "Your rat isn't helping all that much." "Are you sure you need the boys help?" inquired Mom, as she sat back in the chair, with Squeaks firmly anchored to her lap. "Hmm?" mumbled Dad's voice from behind the Chest. "Too right, Jim, old boy, I mean, that is a predator after all," chimed in Tom, helpfully. The head of the python appeared over the top of the Chest, with one of Dad's hands clamped around its neck, "I've got the pointy end. Boys, see if you can find a tail on this thing." Chris and I began to root about happily under the chest, and with the aid of a couple of Dad's walking stick collection, we pried the south end of the snake out from under the Chest. "Dad, we found...oh, yuck." Now, the Discovery Channel will tell you that, when disturbed, some species of snake will: "Secrete a noxious substance from their tails." They lie. Folks, I'm here to tell you that if a snake "secretes" that noxious substance, then a firehose "secretes" water. Got a hell of a range on it. Enough range, as a matter of fact, to reach out and paint a mother from her eyebrows down to the mongoose retching in her lap. And her with waist-length hair. "Eep," said Chris, rather eloquently I thought, as Mom slowly scraped black/green grease off her face with one taloned hand. "Bad luck," murmured Tom. Dad popped up like a prairie dog. "What?" "Dad, it, uh, sprayed..." "Did any of it get on you?" "Ah, hmm. On us? No, but, umm..." "Good, good. Don't let the hind end get back under the Chest. Ali, come here." Ali Cheap-Cheap, who had been watching all of this with intense fascination, jumped and pointed to his torso, "Boss?" "Yes, you," One of Dad's hands reached out and got Ali by the front of his dashiki and pulled him behind the Chest. "Hold this. When I tell you, I want you to drag this end towards the door. Boys, when I lift the Chest, drag the tail out from under, okay?" "Uh, Boss?" Dad got his fingers under the edge of the chest, puffed a couple of times, and then lifted what I swear to God was half-a-ton of hand-carved teakwood. "All right, pull." "Boss, you say 'pull', nah beef, he say 'no'." "Pull the snake, Ali." "Boss." "Bush man, I swear, if you don't..." About this time, Mom levitated some three feet off her chair and, a bit like a Roman candle, exploded in a flaming mass of eyes, hair, grease and claws: "Pull the blankety-blank snake..." ...Ali took off like he'd been goosed with a cattle prod... "...you blankety-blank son of a blankety..." ...Tom's eyebrows crawled up into his hairline as he regarded my rampaging mother... "...blankety-blank mother of a blankety-blank goat..." ...Ali got to the end of the snake with approximately the same results as a running dog hitting the end of his chain, but he moved the snake about three feet... "...Blankety-blank snake blankety-blank IN MY HAIR!" Dad vaulted the Chest, grabbed the python in the middle and heaved him onto the front porch, where he bounced twice and skidded into the yard. Watching the snake haul scales in the general direction of Port Harcourt, Dad sniffed reflectively, dusted off his hands, turned around and the first thing he saw was Mom. "Honey," said Dad, somewhat bemusedly, "Why are you covered in grease?" Mom glared at Dad, whipped around, and with Squeaks still firmly clenched in her hand stomped into the back of the house, muttering explosively and gesturing wildly. Crashing sounds drifted back. "Redheads," opined the worldly-wise Tom. Ali was practically dancing in rage, "Boss! Dis beef, fifty Niara!" "Ali," murmured Dad, as he poured two glasses of Mr. Daniels finest, "You have gold?" "Ah, Boss! I have gold necklace. A necklace such as only a princess could wear!" "Seventy Niara." "Oh, Boss! Seventy Niara is taking..." "Trader man," Dad contemplated the bourbon, "Madame has gone for to fetch her machete." "A blessing on your house, Boss." Ali traded the necklace for the money, bowed once and hot-footed it out the door. Dad gathered up the necklace and both glasses of bourbon, and began wandering in the direction of the destructive noises emanating from the back of the house, "Bye, Tom. See you at the office tomorrow. Boys, go play. Stay away from anything with an appetite." Et voila! The snake story. LawDog __________________ "The Father wove the skein of your life a long time ago. Go and hide in a hole if you wish, but you won't live one instant longer." --The 13th Warrior Bona na Croin The LawDog Files Last edited by LawDog; September 10, 2001 at 03:46 AM.

September 10, 2001, 05:12 AM	#3
citizen Senior Member Join Date: September 12, 2000 Posts: 796	YES!!!!!!!!! Thanks, LD. __________________ ILLEGITIMI NON CARBORUNDUM NRA, GOA, AOC Ignorance can be cured, Stupid is forever Life is too short for dial-up

September 10, 2001, 07:42 AM	#4
Calamity Jane Senior Member Join Date: March 13, 2001 Location: East Tennessee Posts: 899	<applause, applause> Masterful, LawDog! Kudos for a story well-told! __________________ CJ “The world is a fine place and worth fighting for.” ~ Ernest Hemingway

September 10, 2001, 09:29 AM	#6
birdog4 Member Join Date: December 6, 2000 Posts: 27	Great great story. that's what I like to hear about.....family fun! __________________ grouse hunting is not a matter of life or death. It's much more important than that.

September 10, 2001, 09:45 AM	#7
Marko Kloos Staff Join Date: January 12, 2000 Location: Enfield, NH Posts: 5,506	Priceless. I love the mongoose bits...Squeaks seems to suffer from Yorkshire Terrier Disease, a psychological defect which makes the animal overestimate its own size by an exponential factor. You really ought to consider a book of collected LawDog stories. It'd sell like Greenpeace stickers at a Green Party convention. __________________ "The right to buy weapons is the right to be free." --A.E. Van Vogt, The Weapon Shops of Isher the munchkin wrangler.

September 10, 2001, 03:59 AM	#2
PreserveFreedom Guest Posts: n/a	That was worth waiting for.

September 10, 2001, 07:51 AM	#5
buzz_knox Senior Member Join Date: December 2, 1999 Location: Knoxville, in the Free State of Tennesse Posts: 4,191	So much for getting anything constructive done today. I'm going to be sent for a fitness for duty exam because I'm cracking up here.

September 10, 2001, 10:18 AM	#8
George Hill Staff Alumnus Join Date: October 14, 1998 Location: Lapoint, Utah Posts: 11,473	Nice! __________________ MAD OGRE

September 10, 2001, 10:52 AM	#9
Johnny Guest Staff Join Date: August 28, 1999 Location: North Texas Posts: 4,058	OUTSTANDING, Ian - - - - - - Truly outstanding. Perhaps your best story yet. You are a credit to the Regiment, Sir. Johnny __________________ MOLON LABE! Amendment II ensures the rest of the Bill of Rights. Blog: Expert Witness

September 10, 2001, 11:06 AM	#10
4V50 Gary Staff Join Date: November 2, 1998 Location: California Posts: 13,435	By Gawd, that was good! Thank you. __________________ Vigilantibus et non dormientibus jura subveniunt. *Molon Labe!*

September 10, 2001, 11:33 AM	#11
Gator Senior Member Join Date: May 4, 2001 Location: Gainesville Posts: 140	That was truly the most amazing story I've heard in years. The mongoose translations were priceless. Gator __________________ Nolite me glubere!

September 10, 2001, 11:59 AM	#12
TheBluesMan Moderator Emeritus Join Date: June 15, 1999 Location: Ohio Posts: 7,558	Thanks LawDog! __________________ -Dave Miller ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ! NRA Certified Instructor: Pistol, Rifle, Shotgun, Home Firearms Safety, Personal Protection. Tick-off Obama - Join the NRA Today - Save $10

September 10, 2001, 05:23 PM	#13
Monkeyleg Senior Member Join Date: January 25, 2000 Posts: 4,626	Definitely worth waiting for! You're a 21st century Mark Twain. __________________ Eotech Sights, Hunting Rangefinders Crimson Trace, Bushnell Scopes Remington Rifles, Smith and Wesson revolvers Beretta Pistols, Kimber, ACOG sights

September 10, 2001, 05:29 PM	#14
Jim V Senior Member Join Date: January 31, 1999 Location: SE Michigan - USA Posts: 4,041	LawDog, I thank you, my friends will thank you and I have this strange desire to locate an African Pygmy Mongoose. __________________ *MOLON LABE* If it ain't metal, single stack & single action, it ain't a 1911 no matter what it looks like. 1911 Forum THE TUBBY CURMUDGEON

September 10, 2001, 06:22 PM	#15
Art Eatman Staff Join Date: November 13, 1998 Location: Terlingua, TX, USA Posts: 17,453	JimV, some advice: Settle for a Yorky. A mongoose is sorta like a ferret with a really, really bad attitude. , Art __________________ Want to be cruel? Make someone think.

September 10, 2001, 06:58 PM	#16
Zander Senior Member Join Date: December 11, 2000 Location: Middle and East Tennessee, USA Posts: 2,062	Art, even a mongoose is snack food for a Jack Russell...the canine kingdom's equivalent of a scaled-down pit bull.

September 10, 2001, 07:52 PM	#17
Jim V Senior Member Join Date: January 31, 1999 Location: SE Michigan - USA Posts: 4,041	In reality, I don't want any new critters around here. If I got a mongoose, I'd have to get a snake just so LD could write up my adventures. LOL __________________ *MOLON LABE* If it ain't metal, single stack & single action, it ain't a 1911 no matter what it looks like. 1911 Forum THE TUBBY CURMUDGEON

September 10, 2001, 08:05 PM	#18
OkieGentleman Senior Member Join Date: August 18, 1999 Location: OKC Metro Posts: 432	Snake Thank You!! A good laugh!!! I think I would like to meet Lawmom some day!! A model lady if ever there was one.

September 10, 2001, 08:05 PM	#19
C.R.Sam Senior Member Join Date: October 29, 1999 Location: Dewey, AZ Posts: 12,868	Thanx Law Dawg. Few who havent seen em up close realize how big those things are. Like Law Dawg saiz, it's not just the length.....a foot out of the middle would be huge. Sam....been there, the stench is forever memorable.

May 20, 2004, 08:17 PM	#20
Jim V Senior Member Join Date: January 31, 1999 Location: SE Michigan - USA Posts: 4,041	2nd half of the Mongoose v. Python story __________________ *MOLON LABE* If it ain't metal, single stack & single action, it ain't a 1911 no matter what it looks like. 1911 Forum THE TUBBY CURMUDGEON

May 21, 2004, 12:20 PM	#21
gyp_c2 Senior Member Join Date: December 28, 2000 Location: Colorado...Louisiana Posts: 388	hmmm... __________________ >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>g2<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< AVERT

May 21, 2004, 01:05 PM	#22
Chipperman Senior Member Join Date: January 31, 2000 Location: Live Free or Die, Baby! Posts: 1,421	Thanks. A long wait but well worth it. I thought waiting for the next Harry Potter was bad. ----- On a personal note, I occasionally work with large snakes. Here's a short snake sotry for you: A couple of years ago a client came in the clinic door toting a larger Rubbermaid container on wheels. The Receptionists are always leery of any container that does not allow them to visibly identify the beasty contained therein. In this particular case, the container was the current domecile of a 12 year-old Reticulated Python. Said snake was 18 feet long, and weighed 140 pounds. Needless to say, this snake was perfectly capable of killing an adult human without much effort. Well, the purpose of his visit was a sore in his mouth. Hmmmmm.... OK, so I need to examine the mouth of an 18 foot long snake that weighs almost as much as I do. Time to round up a few technicians. Thankfully, the snake was pretty amicable about the whole examination process. One side of the mouth was horribly swollen, with necrotic tissue around the dental arced. Another Vet had been treating him for mouth rot for the past month, without any visible improvement. All right, time for Plan B. Told the owner that a biopsy was in order to determine what exactly was going on there. I don't think he would have been very cooperative about me pulling chunks of oral mucosa out of his mouth for histopathology, so anesthesia would be needed. As this was late on a Saturday, it would have to wait until Monday. The owner lived about 2 hours away, so he elected to admit the snake for the weekend. The debate then began about where to put this creature. The dog runs have gaps too large in them to keep a determined snake inside. The last thing we needed was to have Mrs. Pettibone arrive on Monday morning to reclaim her Poodle Ginger, and have us point to a small bulge in the middle of the snake's abdomen. The snake would have to be given his own room. Thankfully, our hospital was fairly large, and had two rooms specifically designed for Exotic animals. We emptied out one and put the snake inside. On the door, I placed a large sign that read: "DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT OPENING THIS DOOR UNLESS THERE AT LEAST TWO PEOPLE PRESENT" I nodded to myself as I affixed the sign to the door, knowing that it may very well save the life of an employee. I went about seeing the rest of my appointments. Later that evening, the cleaning crew came in. Bob, who was very meticulous about mopping the floor, was not very cognizant about anything above it. Yeah, you know what's coming... As I'm getting packed up to leave for the night, I suddenly hear a loud moaning "WHOOOOAAA",and the sound of cleaning implements scattering across a tile floor. Thinking Bob may have slipped on the wet floor, I ran around the corner to make sure he was alright. There he stood, with his back to the door, looking over at me. His face was alabaster, and his whole body was trembling. I tried my best to suppress a grin as I said, "So I see you met Godzilla." He nodded slowly, and bent over to pick up his mop. Turning his back to me, he went about continuing his custodial duties without saying another word. He never mentioned it to anyone. Monday came and we anesthetized the snake. I took a biopsy of his mouth and we got our answer. Unfortunately for Godzilla, it was Squamous Cell Carcinoma. He lived for about 6 more months.