we were walking down to the the lake and we saw what was first thought to be some mostly greenish garter. A closer look however showed it to be a queen snake!! YAY!! I'd never seen one before. Thrilled. Part of me would have liked to hold it, and the other half is super glad my normal position on wild life is "look with eyes not hands" I can't even begin to explain how hard it was to see the side stripes- they just are not very visible from above 6 feet away. As soon as I got back I had to look it up and make sure I really had seen one... I'm so excited by the sighting!

Maybe this is the universes reward for not becoming a screaming harpy at the neighbors...