Snakes!!! What's the deal?

Who likes snakes?  CERTAINLY NOT me.  Yuk!  You know how those emails go around showing some amazon snake that's sucked down 1/2 a human whilst he sleeps?  Yeah, yikes.

So how then, am I now the snake charmer?  i.e. Harry Potter, LOL.  Olivia has this snake, Raula that was in her classroom as a teacher and it's been in her bedroom for the last couple years, unloved by children's hands.  Olivia loves to freak people out with this snake, hold it over into the shower that Bryn is taking, put it on a rocking chair during a party, unbeknownst to guests looking to sit.  Ridiculous. 

Raula has gotten quite large and sheds her skin frequently.  So a couple weeks ago Olivia jokingly says, "hey can you pick me up a rat".  Me:  um, No.  Then I get to thinking - Olivia is always doing nice things to help me out... how can I deny her one request.  So off to Petco I go. 

Happily they put a medium white rat in a To-Go box and off I trot.  Olivia texts me:  'make sure to drive slow, once the rat was a little rowdy and the box tipped over and it got out in my car'.  MAYDAY!   I get to her house and she's still at school.  I can't figure out how to open the cage so I set the rat-in-a-box on top of the cage and leave.  (washing my hands for good measure of course). 

I text her I couldn't open the cage, she frantically texts back:  'so where is the rat?'  I say, "oh shoot, I left it in the box on your bed, I forgot about that when I went to wash my hands!"  She is maniacal, 'WHAT!!'.  Ok, so Olivia teases a lot, and it's really hard to get her back.  Now I've got her!  But then sweet Chelsa relents, "JK, I left it on the cage, not in your bed".  Olivia:  'NO!!  The snake will smell the rat and flip over the box and the rat will escape into my room!!!'  Freak. 

I have to go back in the house, get her roommate to help me figure out how to open the cage.  Olivia texts: 'could you be a dear and get the dead skin and the log out before tossing the rat to it's death?'  Me:  HellstotheNO I am not reaching in a snake cage of which the snake now knows it's dinner is within reach.  Crazy git!

So I "breathe in for luck"... turn the spotlight on the snake to distract it, pull the screen back, lunge in - grab the log - shake the snake off the log- jerk my arm out, shut the cage!  PFHEW, Unscathed.

Another deep breath

Grab the rat-a-la-Take-Out box, carefully open the top, pull the screen back - move the spotlight around to distract Raula - CHUCK the rat into the corner of the cage - slam the top shut!!  haaaaa 

In 2.5 seconds that dumb rat runs over to say hi to his new housemate and is instantaneously SnAtChEd up into a spiral death grip!  Poor Snow White was bent backwards, arms flung out as if he'd just sung his last opera.

That's all I could watch.  Olivia told me I can't name the dinner anymore.