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While working at the edge of our woods, I looked up to see a blacksnake draped in a dogwood 10 to 12 feet above my head. I tried to ignore it, but I confess, those eyes overhead made it hard to saw a straight line in plywood.
By and by, the blacksnake slipped over to another dogwood, then slithered away.
The same week, walking the dog at 11 p.m., I stepped on a little snake in the dark. Something that wasn’t supposed to be in the middle of the driveway brushed the back of my ankle. The flashlight showed it to be a scarlet kingsnake, with red, black and yellow banding like a coral snake. I knew it wasn’t the venomous coral: They’re mostly down east, and on this little fellow the red stripes didn’t touch the yellow stripes. (“Red on yellow, kill a fellow.”) The dog and I watched it head for the safety of pine-straw mulch.
Not all snakes are friendly, though. Here’s a reminder to be careful when working outdoors.
Lake Wylie photo shoot
If you enjoy perusing home design and décor sites online, here’s a local one to check out: http://crispinteriors.blogspot.com.
Linda Butler recommended Crisp, owned by Emily and Michael Knotts, after I asked readers to share their favorite web sites and blogs.
The two have redone their 1960s Lake Wylie house, and recently were featured in Country Living magazine. There’s a behind-the-scenes look at the photo shoot on their site.
Emily Knotts also “rescues” unique items, Butler said, then sells them online.
Real estate agent’s book
Virginia Bryan, the Keller Williams real estate agent who created the heroine Blakeney Heath, has written another novel available for download. This one is “Sin and Cinnamon,” she says, and definitely is not for kids. You can buy the Kindle version at www.amazon.com, or www.smashwords.com. It’s 99 cents.
I wrote about Bryan – and the character she named for a popular Ballantyne-area neighborhood – back in December. Her stories are built around some of her own experiences, as you’d expect; I’m not sure how this fits. She has another book coming this summer, “Men in Pickup Trucks” – and the first line is, “He should have killed them earlier.”
