The Wild Kingdom

• Sure. I have trees and, therefore, squirrels. They've been dashing around my yard and roof for 20 years. I don't like them, but I'm used to them. I tolerate them and sometimes, not often, enjoy watching their little . . . whatever you call their activities.
• Birds I have also. Sparrows are nesting again in the house Paul built on my upstairs deck, and a mourning dove is trying hang around up there--the sparrows don't like it. Finches are just outside my writing room window. And the other day a duck was sitting on my back fence. Crows, quail, robins, and so on.
• And my favorites, the raccoons.
• About snakes. I see the grass snakes in the summer. I don't like them and have killed one or two, but my neighbor says not to kill them because they eat mice. I don't see how a snake that small could eat a mouse, but what do I know.

However,

My lawn mower guy's report yesterday shook me up. Last week he knocked on my door to show me the RATTLE SNAKE he and Nick had trapped and killed--not far from my front door. I was out of town. I'm home now and I'm scared. You see one rattle snake--he said it was a young one--and you know there are others.

Now what to do? Lola said to call my pest people. Good idea, I thought.

So I called Orkin. I pay them big money to keep my property pest free. They had their expert, Dave, call me.

Dave told me he deals with bugs, not snakes.

He said, "I'm not going into your crawl space if there are rattle snakes." I said, "Well, I don't blame you, but what do you think I should do?" That's when he said the part about being an entomologist, not a snake person and then, "I don't think there's much you can do."

A lot of help.

I said, "Pretend I'm your mother. Is that what you would tell her?"
"Oh boy," he said. "You play the mother card, and it's Mother's Day coming up. Okay. I'll come. Where's the entrance to the crawl space?"

I told him, "in the basement, but if you're a really big guy, it will be hard for you to get in."

"I can probably get in," he said.

"Brad got in," I told him.

"Oh," he said, "you're a customer? Nobody told me you were a customer. Of course I'll come." And so on. That's supposed to be today.

• And then there's this morning's encounter as I attempted to load my washing machine. A large wolf spider was running around inside the washer. Very hard to catch--like I love catching spiders--so I drowned him and then had to fish him out. I mean, I do not want to find dead spider remains in my washed undergarments.

Yeah, speaking of Orkin. I may have to mention the spider to Dave.