I was on the ridge this morning admiring the autumn-red leaves of a gum tree, lit up by the rising sun, when a titmouse landed and, fixing his black eye on me, shouted a word in Bird I know — “Snake!” He shouted it so loud you could have heard him down in the yard. And every time he shouted it, he turned first one way on the branch, then the other. And with every turn, he fixed the eye on that side of his head on me. 

Edisto Beach, SC – Not more than 15 minutes after we finished lugging all of our stuff up two flights of stairs to our vacation rental overlooking a lagoon in the Wyndham Resort, Tammy spotted two turtles, an alligator, and a rat snake as big as my arm winding around the house, and then weaving its way up the lattice-work to the deck where we were all standing, watching in disbelief.