The Two Headed Milk Snake

While I was loading the dishwasher this morning, the kids were enjoying their “ease into the day” episode of Curious George.  Flynn was thumbing through the latest issue of Kids National Geographic.  He stands up from the couch and approaches me in the kitchen with a sense of urgency.  “Mom, you need to see this.”  He hands me the magazine.  I see clearly the full color photo of the concern at hand.  Bright orange and white stripes.  Shining scales.  And two heads.  Two Headed Milk Snake.  I read the paragraph.  Found in Florida.  The article states that it hatched there and the next sentence is  “Why?”  Seriously.  Like one snake with one head isnt bad enough…lets one up it.  But not a whole snake.  Lets just one up this creepy thing a single head.  The worst part of any snake.  The rest of it is just like a slippery rope, and sometimes its like a really pretty slippery rope (tolerable-ish).  But the head is where the bum out is.  Teeth, venom…weird eyes. “WHY?!”  I guess the odds are 10,000 to 1 of a two headed snake hatching.  When discovered, he was placed in captivity because the one body has two brains, making survival difficult for the poor little guy. (why we are protecting this thing I’m sure I dont understand…) Each head trying to flee in separate directions from predators.  Each head having its own bright ideas about where to find food.  I imagined there could perhaps not be a more hellish existence.  Or a more terrifying animal.  Not only is it creepy and two headed, but those two heads are essentially always at odds.  Always just a little pissed off to begin with.  Anyway, I sensed the seriousness Flynn was trying to convey.  I just said “Wow.  Thats really creepy.”  His eyes are slightly widened, “Yeh.  Very.”  He pulls the magazine back toward himself and begins to walk away.  My thoughts are still very much on the photo I just saw.  I say in his direction, “Could you imagine running into that thing outside?”  He spins around, holding his arms out in a posture of distress as he exclaims, “Yeh, and they found it in Florida! Where Grammy and Bumpa live!”  His fearful wonderment has clearly turned to pure stress.  His bed head seems a little big for his lean body as his head bobbles in an expressive nature.  I have to laugh.  With New Smyrna Beach ranked the shark attack capital of the world (thanks Shark Week) and the recent hatching of a certain doubly blessed Milk Snake, its lookin like Florida is dropping to the bottom of Flynn’s list of vacation destinations.  I know he’s at least bringing his entire knife collection this year.