Just doing what I get a paid (a stipend) to do

Little pups at 4 weeks

Look at the fangs, they are like elephant tusks

That is no rubber snake folks, its the real deal

I realize I use the Johnnies hat in a lot of pics but lets get serious it is a good universal gauge and everyone wants to be photographed with it

High-5!

Not sure if you can see Ayla's scratches from the car but she is doing fine

ML (Mike Leither) and I have been having trouble adjusting to the pace of work and quality of tools for manual labor here in Tabgha. Tabgha has an endless amount of work to repair broken, damaged, and out-of-date items. I like to say Tabgha: if it’s not broke, check it tomorrow. We are working for Alexander (extremely knowledgeable in electrician work) right now in the garden removing all the old lamps (resemble street lamps), digging trench for new cable, and installing many smaller lights (3 times as many as the old but flashlight size). ML and I have been discussing, since we first started manual labor work weeks ago, the differences between here and the US-mainly the progressive approaches which we were used to in the States. The first day that we were working for Alexander I was trying to get some odd task done and Alexander recommended that I go about it another way using a much more appropriate tool. I laughed as I told him that we thought of using that tool but it was broke. He gave a quick huff and said, “Welcome to Tabgha” and we both just smiled and started to chuckle. ML and I are sore after today’s work (I’d like to think we are very fit too). We laid about 100 yards of cable encased in tubing at a depth around 8 inches in ground that is either full of: roots, cement slabs, landscape rock, or woven with other tubing (that is not on the 10-plus year-old plot map). We are using tools that make me feel like I am in some 1920s prison movie. We are equipped with a pickaxe and Italian grape hoe. If you are not familiar with these archaic tools Google them and try to keep from spraying spit on your computer screen in laughter. I lost count of how many times I unsuspectingly hit a hard surface and felt the vibration up through my head and down to my toes.

This morning (Oct 1st) as Thomas and I were exiting the cage of the Tierhaus (in German: Animalhouse-rabbits, birds, and guinea pigs) after feeding them Thomas screamed, “A SNAKE!! AHHHH!” and bolted out the door. I laughed thinking it was a joke but as I looked back into the cage, sure enough, there was the face of the serpent. I am deathly afraid of snakes, but Thomas is afraid of everything and I knew he would not go in to face it (we had to get it away from the small pets) so armed with some aerosol spray that sedates such animals and that same Italian grape hoe from yesterday I entered again. As I moved melon-sized boulders (we created a nice habitat in the cage) with the hoe my enemy became apparent to me and I tell you he was 10 feet long if he was a foot. Thomas was outside the cage (too scared to come in) and I told him to bang on the side of the fence and the snake rose up and hissed, and at this moment I looked death right in the eyes…and death blinked first. With two thunderous strokes I left him lifeless. As I sat there on the field of battle measuring the carnage and examining my life I realized how frank this confrontation was; how lucky I truly was that we spotted the snake first instead of stepping on it or startling it and that I was able to kill it. As I left the cage I noticed some fluffs of fur under a shelter and grimaced thinking that maybe one of the rabbits was taken before we could do something. I uncovered the shelter and there was a baby rabbit no bigger than a pack of bubble gum. From death springs life. You know, you and I are not so different. We both put our pants on one leg at a time, but after I put my pants on I go out and save lives. I did not wake up this morning and ask to be a hero, we never do. I just went out and faced the day, because that is what heroes do (cue the music Foo Fighters “My Hero” and fade to black).