serpentine

It finally happened, just as I've been dreading since last year.  The conversation started innocently enough.

Peter: Hey, honey?  Do you know where I put my glove?
Me:  Glove? No.  Why do you need... oh.
And it hit me... there's another snake in the house.  Dangit.
Peter: Oh, here it is.
He dons the glove. 
Wait a second, he's going into the guest bathroom.  The same guest bathroom I'd just been rummaging in trying to find my composition books for class on Tuesday.  The same guest bathroom that is, I now realize, chock full of snakey hiding places.
Me:  Where is it?
As I try to see around him in the tiny space.
Peter: There.  I lifted the toilet lid and it was just hanging out there on the seat.
On the seat.  The seat.  This fellow had nestled his snakey self in multiple draping coils along the back of the toilet seat near the hinge.  Lucky thing it was toward the back when Peter lifted the lid.
Peter grabs the awkwardly positioned snake.  I have retreated to my desk.
And then I hear Peter quietly talking to the snake.
Peter: You cheeky bastard!
Me: What happened?
Peter: He bit me.
Me: What can I do?
Peter: Reassure me that it's not poisonous.
And without even getting a closer look at the snake, I respond calmly.
Me: It's not poisonous.
I look closer, confirming that it's the same type of snake we've been finding all year and repeat again that it's not poisonous.  Peter brings it out into better light, unhooks its fang from his finger and gets a better hold.  I look again.
Me: No, definitely not poisonous.
Of course, inside I'm freaking out, thinking I -could- be wrong.  I could have misidentified the thing.  There might, right now, be venom coursing through Peter's veins.  Oh geez, what if I'm wrong?
Peter: Ok.  Going to go release him then. 
Me: I'm going with you.
Thinking, just in case you pass out and I have to drag your toxin-filled body to the ER.
Peter gets to the end of the driveway, gives the snake a not-so-gentle toss up into the branches of a pine tree about 20 feet away.
Me: Nice distance. 
We watch the snake as it casually makes its way along the branch to the trunk of the tree.  We return to the house before it can get down and exact further revenge.
Peter: I was ready to just hang onto the thing and have you drive me to the ER, you know.  Bet they wouldn't have kept me waiting long with Mr. Slithers in my hands.
Me: How are you feeling?
Peter: Hmm? Oh, fine.
Me:  You. Our bathroom. Now.
I rinse the area under running water, which has the effect of taking away the minuscule drops of blood and removing all traces of the shallow bite.  But I insist on a soap-and-water wash.  Then rinse it with alcohol.
Peter: It's fine. Itches a bit, but it's fine.
Me: I'm going to peroxide it.
Peter: It's fine.
Me: I am going to peroxide it and you are going to let me because you have just been bitten by a freaking SNAKE.
Peter lets me pour hydrogen peroxide over his fingers - no bubbling occurs.
I douse it in alcohol again and finally let him escape from my semi-frantic wound care of his now nonexistent wounds.

So.  It finally happened.  Snake number six managed to get a bite in before being removed.  We figured it out, though.  The way Peter had to grab the critter is what got him into trouble.  Usually he can go for the tail and tease them out from their hidey-holes, but this time it was curled up and he had to go straight for the head.  In a cramped space, that's difficult to do.

He's fine, by the way.  No redness, no swelling, no itching after the first few moments. 

I'm fine, too.  But I'm steering clear of that bathroom for... maybe forever.