Today's 10-minute walk is helping you keep your fitness promise, which adds another link to your

growing fitness chain. I'm walking early in the morning. I can see the start of sunrise off to the east,

but still fairly dark. And this morning for the

first time, it's not the first time I've walked before sunrise, but this morning I've got a

flashlight. You can hear it go on and off. A little freaked yesterday. Dave and I were walking

along the trail behind our neighborhood.

And there was a snake.

It was a little snake, maybe two feet, foot and a half two feet.

It was just kind of sitting there on the trail and it's blended in with the trail.

And my first reaction was, oh, that's a baby copperhead.

Because we have copperheads down here.

And I stopped, took a picture of it later when I went home, looked it up,

and clearly I don't know my snakes. It wasn't even close to a copperhead.

There was a little baby garter snake. Or maybe it was a full-grown garter snake because they don't get all that big, I don't think.

But anyhow, just the idea of walking along and enjoying my walk and there's a snake across the trail is a little unnerving.

So this morning I have a flashlight.

Just in case there's a snake encounter of the third kind.

Shortly after we moved into the house here

where we live in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, a neighbor of ours.

He lives on our street, I don't know, maybe a dozen houses down, introduced himself.

His name is Alan.

Alan was pursuing fitness when we met him.

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