Got home from work, and my wife was on the phone with her brother, who is in the Hospital in Idaho.
He tends to take these crazy mountain man backpacking trips by himself all the time, and he was on one this week. So at some point on Wednesday, he's 14 miles from his car, in the backcountry, 70 miles from the nearest hospital, when he gets nailed, and nailed good, buy a timber rattler.
So he hoists his 70lb pack and starts hoofing it back towards his car. Around nightfall, he comes across some canoers, and asks if they can take him down the river. They say no, there are class 5 rapids or something that need to be portaged, they can't do the river in the dark, yadda yadda yadda. He sets up with them, and they feed him, and keep an eye on him through the night.
Next morning (yesterday), he tells them he is feeling okay, and hikes off for his car again. He's feeling pretty light headed and woozy (I said he was nuts), so he sticks his leg in the river for a while, starts to feel better, and takes off again, eventually reaching the trailhead and his car.
He gets in the car, and starts driving, drinking lots of water. He gets a few miles when he out of the blue projectile vomits all over the dash of his car. So he pulls over, and around then some Park Rangers, sent by the canoers, from what I understand, catch up with him, ask if he is the guy who got bit by the snake, and start off for the hospital - 70 miles away.
At the hospital, he is told that his body is basically just turning off - his liver is konked out, etc. He asks them if he's going to die, and they pause and say, "well... probably not." (!!) He seems to have been heavily invenomated.
Anyway, I guess he must be doing better at the moment, though they are holding onto him at the hospital for a few more days... wowser though!
This is now the 2nd person in my extended family to get hit (a prairie rattler got my dad in '87, mildly, and was told he was 'mildly' invenomated... and he was pretty screwed up for a few days). Wonder when my number is up!