Meet The Fids: Snidely Whiplash – Naked Fid #1

** Wednesday, December 3, 2008: This is probably cheating, but I just found about Mama's Losin It!!'s weekly Writer's Workshop and I selfishly wanted to get in on it. However, I don't have time to write anything else up today, so I'm dragging this out of the archives. If you've already read it, no problem... just read it again! LOL! I promise next week I will do better. Ok, Enough of my blathering... On with the show!!**

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I keep getting emails from people wanting to know more about my Cast of Characters. So starting now, I'm beginning a new series called Meet The Fids (Furred & Feathered Kids). Another series will start soon to introduce the more human members of the cast. So, without further ado, I'd like to introduce:

Snidely Whiplash – Naked Fid #1

Throughout the years we've had a plethora of critters (2-, 4-, and no-legged) pass through our domicile. The kids were always wanting a pet – not an abnormal desire – however Hubby was dead set against adopting 4-legged furry critters (fids or furry kids) and so a couple of times we opted for more reptilian pets (naked fids) because they offered the benefits of confined housing and shorter life spans.

Our first naked fid was a red-eared slider the boys found roaming the street after having presumably been displaced by all the construction in our new neighborhood. They insisted that he was homeless and it was our duty to help him. So, Snidely Whiplash took up residence in an aquarium in the living room.

This red-eared slider is not Snidely. For some stupid reason I never took any pictures of him!

I did my best to take good care of him, but his water was often not as clean as it should have been, and sometimes the boys would forget to feed him his freshies (veggies I’d already chopped up and bagged for easy dispensing). Eventually his shell started getting scaly and his little head seemed to get droopy and I realized that a wild turtle just couldn’t live in captivity – at least not with our clan as his captors. I was in the process of trying to figure out how to break it to the boys when Grandma and Grandpa (Hubby’s parents) came for a visit.

Grandma has always been a talker. Back then, she had a conversational loop of about 15 minutes. She’d tell the same things in the same order and the same tone of voice over and over... and over... and over...and... hardly slowing down enough to take a breath between the end of one loop and the beginning of the next. (Thankfully, since Pop died she gets out more and has a longer loop – but that’s whole ‘nother story.) On the occasion of this visit, Grandma was into her third or fourth loop replay when Twig decided that he was bored. He wanted to show off Snidely, so he got him out of the tank and brought him over to where Grandma was standing during her oration. Ever so patiently he waited with Snidely held at chest level, and waited. And waited. And waited until his eight-year-old enthusiasm finally got the better of him. He just HAD to get Grandma’s attention. And what better way to get a 55-year-old woman’s attention than to poke her in the arm with a turtle??

It all happened so fast and so slowly at the same time. You know that slow-motion, time whizzing by as it stands still feeling that causes your head to spin and your brain to scream, NOOOOOO!!!! while at the same time your body is unable to move because there seems to be some invisible goo that is making movement impossible... yeah, that. Before I could stop it, Snidely reacted to the elbow aggressor in the only way he knew how – he bit it. Not just a little nip. Not a quick pinch and release. OHHH NOOOO – he latched on and HELD ON! And in that same instant of timelessness, Grandma, having suddenly realized that she’d become a turtle hanger, screamed bloody murder spewing several curse words that I’m not sure many drunken sailors would consider appropriate for use even in a barroom brawl.

Flailing her arms wildly, she kept turning in circles trying to see what had hold of her. I reached her just as she was about to fling her arm again and grabbed it yelling, “MOM! STOP! He’s never gonna let go if you keep trying to shake him off!” Once she stopped thrashing around I was able to grab the poor dazed and confused turtle and lift him up to at least take the pressure of his weight off of the mouthful of flesh. When Grandma quieted down I noticed that the guys, Bug, Twig, Hubby and Pop, were all literally holding their sides and howling with laughter. Well, that just set Grandma off again. It took every ounce of self control I had to keep from losing it myself and joining the guys in a hearty round of hysterical giggling, but I was way too close to my MIL to risk being backhanded! She was THAT steaming mad. LOL!

It took about 5 minutes of coaxing and the temptation of some fresh lettuce to get Snidely unattached and back in his aquarium. Amazingly, his strong grip hadn’t broken the skin, so there are no permanent scars to remind my MIL of her harrowing ordeal. To this day, though, she will cross to the other side of the road if she sees a turtle anywhere within 50’.

A few days later, after having him checked out by a rehabber to ensure he was healthy enough to survive, I took Snidely Whiplash out to the San Jacinto Monument and set him free. I hope that he invited all his new turtle buddies to share the feast of goodies I left. What better way is there to meet your new neighbors than to have a party?

This is exactly how I remember Snidley looking the last time I saw him. For some odd reason, he never looked back.

Picture credits:

http://animal-world.com/encyclo/reptiles/turtles/RedEaredSlider.php and http://www.flickr.com/photos/singingfish/36420764/