Creative Snoring

It is estimated that Australia has over 24 million wild pigs. I was on a photo Safari in Queensland to capture on film the King Kong of feral hogs. The locals call him Jambi.

Jambi weighs over 1000 pounds and is well over nine feet long. He has a harem of 45 sows and multiple piglets. Wherever they move, they create mass destruction of the land and many a domestic animal, even humans disappear when Jambi is in the area.

My guide was Mark Sorrow. He carried a 300 Winchester rifle and a 44 magnum sidearm. I carried a Cannon EOS 1D camera with multiple lenses. We were on an early morning stalk of the Jambi herd. Even before we started, Mark explained the dangers involved with getting close to Jambi.

“If the pigs get startled, one will let out a snort and they will all charge. When we are trampled, Jambi will eat us.”

“Ok,” I said. “Is there anywhere close by where I can photograph butterflies?”

Mark had located the herd a week earlier and as we walked quietly through the outback you could begin to smell their stench.

“Very quiet,” Mark whispered. He held up the rifle at the ready. Each footstep was carefully placed to not snap a twig. My camera was on and ready for shooting. Crouching low we moved through the tall grass and into a tunnel eaten through thorny bramble bushes.

Mark stopped and without saying a word, motioned with his hand to be very still.

“Snort!!!  Squeal!!!” The sound came from behind me. Mark spun around, a shocked look on his face, rifle aimed. I spun around, flipping out of bed, hitting my head on the night stand as I fell to the floor.

“Darn it, Milton!” I moaned.

Milton Barry, my daughter’s dog, my grand-dog, had been sleeping at the edge of my bed. Milton snorts when he snores.

We all know someone who snores. I myself have never snored but insist that my wife was dreaming when she mistakenly thought I was snoring and got up in the middle of the night to sleep on the TV room couch.

In my 65 years of life and having experienced sleep nearly 365 nights of each of those years, I have had ample opportunity to witness and categorize that which I have called, “creative snoring”.

The first is the “Pooo, Pooo.” This is not loud, but you can imagine someone lying on their back, blowing a ping pong ball into the air or a clam spitting water.

Next is the “low-vibration drone.” I was attending a men’s retreat at a lake in Ravensdale, Washington. There were 12 of us in a cabin and since it was stuffy, the windows were open. Sometime around 11:00, a man started the drone. After about fifteen minutes, I could hear the same drone being echoed from outside the cabin by the shore. First one, then more and more. Sure enough, the bullfrogs were in heat and the cabin was surrounded by toads.

The intolerable snore is what I call the “quarry-driller.” This will drive you from the building. A quarry-driller rarely has rodents or cockroaches living in his home because even a cockroach has its limits. On a hunting camp at Lake Curlew during deer season, eight of us were in one cabin. One of the men and his son shared a room. When the father fell asleep, the quarry-drilling started. It was not long before the son left the cabin to sleep on the bed of his pickup. By morning, we were all sleeping in our vehicles. The next year he had a CPAP machine and all was quiet. We did however have a small Honda generator on standby just in case the power went out.

Lastly is one I like to call the “gurgling-gasp.” This is the sound my wife makes with a pillow over her face but we are dealing with this in our counseling sessions.

I like to think that there is a good reason that God created us with the ability to snore and I am sure that there are many snores I have yet to experience. But until they create a small, convenient, comfortable device to stop snoring altogether, I am going to make sure that Milton Barry does not sleep by the side of my bed.

(Title photo by Magda Ehlers)

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