Every modern gal is allowed an irrational fear or two and the following is mine:

I did not take this picture, but this is pretty much identical to what I found sitting on top of a package that was laying on my welcome mat when I got home from work today. Naturally I dropped my purse, computer bag and lunch bag on the ground and yelped.

Now, I realize this is nothing but a fairly harmless garter snake that was probably disturbed from his hunky-dory life in the underground drain pipe when my city got its first downpour in weeks today but that doesn’t mean he should be hanging out on MY welcome mat or that I have to like him.

Once I threw my bags on the patio wall (I didn’t want him finding his way into my lap top bag), I stole down the sidewalk until I found a long enough stick to poke Mr. Snake with while maintaining an appropriate distance. Of course by the time I got back to my door he was gone, which prompted me to believe he HAD in fact found his way into my computer bag. I poked the package on the mat to make sure he wasn’t hiding under or in it and poked all the bags sitting on my patio wall. Finding nothing, I leapt over my welcome mat and into my condo, slamming the door behind me and frightening the Modern Dog in the process.

Four hours later, I’m still alive and well as is my irrational fear every time I look at that picture.

And on a slightly related tangent: the package on the mat was my “gift” from Sports Illustrated for re-subscribing. Actually my second gift. The first was a Tennessee Titans t-shirt. This one was a fleece with the Titans’ logo embroidered on it. Nice, right? Especially since the Titans are my team? Wrong. Sports Illustrated believes all of their subscribers are in the vicinity of an XL size because of course no small or medium sized Modern Gal would NEVER subscribe. Therefore both t-shirt and fleece are their standard XL size.

I guess the Modern Beau’s dad will be getting a Titans fleece for Christmas this year.