Why me?

  Had a scare today.  I went downstairs to pull a load of laundry out and put it in the dryer.  I got everything out except there was maybe another sock or something. I reached down and Holy Shit it was a snake and It looked alive although I did not see if for long because I jumped back so quickly.  I HATE SNAKES!!     I have no one to call to get rid of a snake for me. In retrospect I wonder if the cops would come and help me out.  Probably not.  shit shit shit It can't stay there.
 I will not pick up a snake in my hands and it looked a little too big to use a towel and besides that it too up close and personal for me.   Sooooo I figured I needed something long to grap it with and  aha, a set of kitchen tongs which are not as long as I would have liked but didn't stop to try and think of anything else.
 I marched up stairs , got my tongs, and marched bravely back downstairs.  do it now before you lose your nerve.  My heart is racing and my mouth is dry.  I reach down and grab him about an inch behind his slimy gross mouth.  I clamped down hard because it started to move and his mouth opened up and he would have bitten me if he could have.
 Out of the washing machine he comes and then the tail starts to swing and curl and  IT TOUCHED ME@@@@@@    Any other location and I would have dropped him and ran but  if I dropped him then I had a loose live snake somewhere waiting to scare me in my basement.  So I chanted don't let go don't let go don't let go and walked carefully but quickly as I could to the bulkhead which I had smartly opened before I got the snake on the tongs.
 I got him up to the top and he touched me again and I just had to let him go right outside the bulkhead opening.   I looked around for something to kill hiim with but there was nothing handy so he slithered away to scare me at a later date and place.  My heart was racing for a long time afterwards.   And now ,  HOW did he get in the washing machine. Some of the options are unthinkable. Most of them are so I just am not going to think about it.