Proof that reality is better than fiction
Stupid things NOT to do with a pool. DO NOT try this at home. We were stupid and it just barely did not end badly. This story is for humor purposes only... got your attention yet? Good
OK, this story is about me… more or less. I started it, but my friends took it to the next level. Fortunately for all, no parents were around and the fire department was not involved. Got your attention yet? Good. This little adventure occurred when I was 19-20. I only told my mom about it two years ago (when I was 33).
There was the party, see? Alcohol was involved, but not in the manner you think. My friends and I hate alcohol. The smell of it makes me nauseated. A cap full of NyQuil will send one of my friends into a three day coma (where he erased a hard-drive, but that’s another story). Anyway, I was explaining to the group that anything more than 50% alcohol will, in fact, burn.
To prove my point, I dug a bottle of 70% Isopropyl rubbing alcohol out of my friends bathroom. I dumped a bit on the driveway and lit it. It was just turning twilight and the alcohol burned with a lovely blue-green flame. I should have noticed that evil gleam in Greg’s eyes. sigh.
Greg is/was a character. He had a chip on his shoulder about… well… everything. He lived in more homes while I knew him (while he was in high school) than I’ve lived in my entire life. I still don’t know why we were friends, but I’m glad we’re not now.
Greg grabs a couple of guys and they jump in his POS station wagon and take off. They come back about 20 minutes later with 7 botttles of rubbing alchohol from the store. I can only imagine what the checkout clerk thought.
So we gather a crew, distribute the bottles with instructions, and tromp to the backyard. You see, Greg had this pool. A 4-foot, above ground pool. Now, above ground pools have a heavy plastic liner and there’s a rim that goes around the top wall of the pool to hold the liner in place. To hold the liner in place, this rim has a shallow depression… that runs the circumference of the pool… which we promptly filled with 70% Isopropyl alcohol… and set on fire.
I have never seen a prettier blue flame shoot 5 feet into the sky. It was a ring of cool fire. There were some neat alcohol slicks merrily burning away in the water. It was majestic, it was great… until Fat Freddy jumped through the fire and cannonballed into the pool. The tidal wave hit the rim… went into the rim… and pushed flaming alcohol all over the lawn. Cold fire is Good.
At that point, I decided that my time with these people was nearing an end. They were rather more impressed with me and I, rather less impressed with them.
Just remember kids, hang out with smart people, but be careful if they suggest you do something that “would be cool if”.
Mom vs. Snake Round 1
My dad and grandfather co-owned a ranch, the Diamond MC (that’s registered by the way). It was very close to a small little town in East Texas called Spurger. It was closer to a wide spot in the road called Fred, Texas. It was a neat place, my granddad ran some horses, dad just wanted open space to shoot his guns. Mostly at snakes.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I love animals. I have many, many animals and take care of them. I am against most forms of hunting (especially of large predators like cougars and wolves). I firmly believe that humans have a responsibility to animals as they can’t protect themselves from us. Also, many snakes are beneficial to farmers and ranchers by eating rodents that would otherwise eat crops or whatever. However… with all that being said, there is a big empty, black hole in my heart when it comes to the heavy hitters of the snake world. There are four genus of poisonous snake in the US, they all live in Texas.
The year before, my mom stepped on a snake. A copperhead. She did keep her leg, though it was a near thing for a while. We didn’t much like copperheads at our ranch.
On this particular day, myself, my mom and my two cousins were strolling along the main road… OK a dirt road behind our ranch. Gran was handling his horses and dad and my cousin’s father, Sandy, were out protecting us from vicious pine-cones by blowing them into little-bitty pieces with large bore handguns.
My mom suddenly froze on the road grabbing two of us. We all stopped and stared at a truly giant copperhead. He was laying across the road, stretching from one side to the other. Now, in some of my tales, I’m known to… ummm… exaggerate… for comic effect. This was no exaggeration, this was a big freaking snake.
Now, my mother, who is, in most things, quite the logical individual, did something crazy. Once bitten and all that I guess. She says to us, “Don’t let it get away. I’m going to get a gun.” And she proceeds to run back to the house… about a mile away. So the three of us, Jen being the oldest about about 11, stare at this snake that’s longer than any of us. The snake is not concerned.
About half an hour later my mom returns with a huge gun in her hand. With the men-folk off in the wilds, the only gun she can find is one of Sandy’s “Special” guns. A big-bore pistol (I assume a .45, but I don’t remember) with many special add-ons and some custom, hand loaded, anti-tank rounds… roughly equivalent to 18 inch naval guns. [See the exaggeration for comic effect?)]The snake is not concerned.
Mom lays down in the road with the barrel of the gun about 6 inches from the snake. The snake is not concerned.
She squeezed the trigger and several things happened simultaneously:
- She was pushed backward about 2 feet.
- A tongue of flame from the gun barrel hit the snake.
- A large chunk of the middle of the snake disappeared.
- A dust cloud seen on primitive weather satellites was created.
The snake was now concerned… or at least the front half was. And then mom did something truly amazing… she pulled the trigger again… and again… and again. Each time cutting the snake into smaller and smaller pieces. The pieces that were left were beginning to char slightly from the heat. She had created a furrow several feet long in the road. You know how injured snakes twist spasmodically? There wasn’t enough left of this snake to twist.
After the sounds from the final round died off (I believe that they are still echoing in the trees up there though), we looked in awe at a scene of destruction only matched by the first Predator movie. You remember, where they hose the forest with a ten thousand rounds from a Gatling gun. They could have just used Sandy’s pistol.
Finally, Pat (my dad) and Sandy burst out of the tree line, festooned with artillery. [I've always wanted to use the word festooned.] Seeing the pieces of snake remaining, they decided to continue the fight. After several minutes, a thin smear of lead has coated the road, several feet in each direction from where the snake lay.
Since then, no copperheads have appeared at that ranch. Other snakes, not having learned their lesson have appeared, but they didn’t stay long.
Mom vs. snake Round 2
Many, many years after utterly decimating a copperhead, mom ran afoul of another snake. Well, mom was actually defending her mother… and it wasn’t really a poisonous snake… in fact it was sleeping. But I get ahead of myself.
My grandfather loved his ranch, but was in moderately poor health, so we sold it. This was well after my mom and dad got divorced, so not much going on at the ranch. Gran used some of the money from the ranch to build a garage apartment next door to my mom’s house so he could keep an eye on us. We had about an acre and a half, which was very cool, especially for being in the city limits. At one point we had two horses in our backyard. This was much later though.
Each night my grandparents would walk the perimeter of the land five or six times. On this occasion, Gran was somewhere and my grandmother (hereafter referred to as ‘Tince’, don’t ask me why) was walking on her own. Mom and I were in our house doing our nightly things, eating, homework, whatever. Suddenly, out of the backyard, a call to arms rings out…
“SNAKE! SNAKE!” my grandmother shouts. I run outside with the intention of throwing myself in front of the viscous predator and keeping my maternal grandmother from harm. [Hey, she made me M&M cookies, bitten by a snake would be a small price to pay!] Mom, knowing Gran wasn’t home, ran for the arms locker. OK, she kept a .38 under her pillow.
Gran, still the rancher type, had planted a not insubstantial garden in one corner of the land. And there was the snake. Tince was jumping up and down screaming her head off. And there was the snake… asleep… under the green beans. As I reach the startling conclusion that there is no immediate threat, my pulse slows, my brain kicks in, and Mom arrives with a fist full of gun and blood in her eyes.
Again, let me say that I don’t like to hurt animals, I really couldn’t care less about people, but I don’t like hurting animals… for no reason. This snake was minding its own business, but Tince was freaking out, mom has a personal grudge, and I had to live with these women. It wasn’t like the snake was making me M&M cookies every Christmas, now was it?
So mom stealthily approaches the snake from downwind. A hunter on the prowl. Her target has been sighted and locked. Weapons are armed. No deer hunter ever moved so silently. No tiger ever made an ambush this effective. No, my dear readers, this snake was doomed.
She stood over the snake. Carefully cocked the pistol and fired. A thunderous boom echoed through the town. A cloud of freshly mulched dirt showered into the air. The snake was still asleep. We could see no injury on the snake. We looked at mom in surprise. We know she’s a better shot than this. She sets a look of grim determination on her face, cocks the pistol and fires again. Another boom, another cloud, another miss.
At this point, I start giggling. Thrice more she fires, thrice more she misses, thrice more the snake is unharmed. Nay, it is not even awaked.
Mom looks confused. Tince is now actively worrying about being arrested. Neighbors are leaning over the fence putting bets on each fired round. Mom fires again. click. Oops, five round revolver. She heads for the house mumbling under her breath. I trudge over to the garden shed for a shovel.
Mom returns as I’m about to cut the snake down with a spade. “No,” she shouts, “I’ll get it this time.” She hasn’t reloaded. No, she got a bigger gun. Apparently, she knows where Gran kept his .357. Now a .357 and a .38 are basically the same cartridge. In fact any .357 gun can fire .38 rounds and many .38s can fire a .357… once. However, the two cartridges are not the same. It’s kind of like a the cute, little convertible Mustang that you get for your 16 year-old daughter and a Shelby Boss Mustang. They’re both mustangs, they’ll both kill you, but one is WAAAAY more powerful than the other.
So mom appeared with something roughly akin to a shore bombardment naval cannon. It gets worse. This revolver had six rounds.
The first shot nearly knocks her down. I can’t describe the sound to you because everyone in the city limits was deaf now. When the dust settled, we see that the snake is wounded. Yay, she got it. However, the snake, now realizing it is in imminent danger responds by twisting around itself very rapidly. Such that the next five rounds only graze it twice more. We now have a wounded snake, two empty guns… and, yep, a shovel.
The shovel is a useful tool. Not the least use is throwing the remains of a snake over the fence into the ditch.
As an aside… that particular patch of ground never really grew anything again. Gran swore it was the lead poisoning.
More later...
BTW: I'm planning on writing a book with all these crazy stories in it.
