Can you See the Snake under the Hood? A Chinle Story

Can you find the snake?

Here's the story:

 The parents and older folks(Steve and I) are in the backyard doing what adults do at a cook-out(drinking beer and wine).

The kids(not Steve's or mine) are playing in the street.  To be fair it is a cul- de- sac.

One child comes running around the house to announce.  "There is a rattlesnake in the street"(where some very young children are playing).   This brings back memories of when our kids were playing outback(presumably with matches although not in the street)  at a similar gathering when one child runs in to say there is a fire out back.  But that is another story….

Parents and old folks(Steve and I ) run out to the "street".

It would be a better story if I could say the snake really is a rattlesnake but there is no rattle.

It is a very pretty snake however and it is scared by all the commotion.  It slithers under a vehicle for protection.  In fact it is our jeep(the old folks).

And then we watch it swiftly and skillfully slide up the tire and into our engine.   Cameras (actually phones) click away.  The snake must be camera shy.

I insanely keep asking if it is poisonous and whether a snake can get from the engine of a vehicle into the interior as into the driver's or passenger's  seat.  I am assured it cannot but I don't believe it.  I watched a show on the Nature channel once….

Steve starts the engine to scare the snake out... or maybe shred the poor thing to bits.

Snake parts do not spew out of the open hood of the jeep.  Neither does a snake crawl out from under our jeep.

Steve must get to work.  He is on call.  He drives away and parks at the hospital.  Later he hears that someone saw a snake at the emergency dock.

This is what passes for entertainment in Chinle.

So I am going to assume I do not have to worry about a poisonous or non-poisonous snake in my jeep. This snake hopped off at the hospital.

But wait!  I had parked the jeep up on the mesa earlier that evening to walk Reena.  I suspect he (the snake)rode back to the hospital campus with me.  How many hitch-hiking snakes have I or will I pick up on the mesa?  And will any of them be a rattlesnake?

After note:  We later learn that the Navajo often put "medicine" around their vehicles to keep snakes from crawling into them.   Can I get this medicine at a swap meet?