One of the young surveyors, not much older than my 20 years, came in with the data from a job he had just finished.  We typed it in, and passed the results to the Engineer.  Pretty soon we heard him cussing and yelling, and he came roaring in to the room where the surveyor and I were working.

He demanded to know exactly what was wrong with him?  He had specifically ordered that the trace (the path surveyed) follow the ditch through the property!

The surveyor looked at him for a minute, and explained:

"Well, we were surveying along the ditch.  It was real messy, with shrubs hanging over the sides of a real narrow ditch, and a couple of inches of muck in the bottom, but that's part of the job..."

Engineer:  "So what happened?!  You ruined my trace!"

Surveyor:  "Anyway, then right here,"   (pointing to where the trace suddenly jumped 30 feet to the left) " I dropped the survey marker."

Engineer:  "So What?! Have you lost your MIND?!!"

Surveyor:  "And then I bent over to pick it up, I happened to look to the right, under the overhanging shrub.  And there was a Moccasin under the bush about 6 inches in front of my face.  And I turned my head to the left, and there was another one.  Since my feet wouldn't move, I looked behind me, between my legs, and there were snakes on both sides as far as I could see.  And I looked 'up', further along the ditch, and there were STILL snakes as far as I could see."

Surveyor:  "And then I was in the woods, almost back to the truck, and the other guy had grabbed his transit because he figured anything that scared me that bad was good enough for him.  And if you want that trace run through that ditch, you can wait for cold weather or do it yourself, and I am NOT paying for the survey marker, either."

And then he went home.  And the Engineer never brought it up again.