The Turtle Incident

We've had a lot of contractors buzzing around our house, remodeling things for our big move.  Of course my son, Bubba, had to befriend them.  Naturally, they all liked Bubba.

"Hey, Bubba," one of the guys said.  "Do you want to see something?"

Bubba looked at me.  "Can I, Mama?"

I nodded.  "Sure."  I couldn't wait to see what they had.

We went outside.  And what do you think we saw?  A giant snapping turtle.  It was crawling across my front yard.

"What is that thing doing here?" I asked.

"It crawled out of the back of my pickup truck," the man drawled in his thick Kentucky accent.

"Oh yeah?" I asked.  "And what was it doing in the back of your pickup truck?"

"It was on the side of the road when I was driving here this morning, so I picked it up and tossed it in."

I looked at that guy. "Okay.  So how did it get out of your pickup truck?"

The guy shrugged.  "Beats me.  All I know is he was crawlin' over to your neighbor's bushes.  I had to drag him out by the tail. Like this."  He picked up the turtle by his tail and let it hang.

Bubba giggled.  "Can I try that?"

"Absolutely not!" I said.

"Ya wanna see what else he can do, Bubba?" the guy asked.

"Yeah.  What else can he do?'

The man put the turtle down and stuck his big foot in front of its mouth.  And guess what happened?  The turtle bit the guy's work boot - hard!

I looked at the guy and shook my head.  "I hope those boots have steel toes, otherwise when you take your boot off, you might be missing a few of your own!"

The guy laughed.

Bubba grinned.    "Can we keep it as a pet?"

"NO!!!!!!" 

I asked the man to take that reptile back to whatever swamp it came out of. 

"Yes, ma'am," he said and picked the thing up by its tail and tossed him back into the pickup truck.

Oy gewalt!