The parable of the lost snake or a novel in-law deterrent

We have a snake, well truthfully it belongs to a young lady who is out of the country for a couple years, but I never thought I'd be a snake owner (or sitter).  But apparently our scaly friend has slithered his way into our hearts because he got out the other day and we were all rather sad about it.  So I looked up snake escapes on google and found one article that has been plagiarized on a hundred different sites and set about trying to locate the beast.  I'm apparently rather fond of the creature, as is my son, and I certainly didn't want to have to explain to his young owner that he had vanished on my watch.  Worse, my in-laws are coming this weekend and they don't like even the idea of a snake in the house, let alone one loose in the basement where the spare bedroom is!  Then I have to find a pet sitter for the snake and his rodent friends while we are gone this summer and how do you tell the pet sitter that you have a snake but you don't?  Awkward!  And then we are in a rental so it isn't even my house should he die in an air duct or get caught in the oven or washing machine: the gruesome (and expensive) possibilities are endless.

One of the suggestions was to sit quietly and watch/listen hoping to find some sign of the creature, but that really doesn't happen at our house, at least until the kids are in bed and by then I need sleep too.  But last night it so happened that everyone went to bed at a decent hour and the house was silent, and this being a nocturnal species, I sat in various dark rooms and listened, though I thought it rather pointless as he could be anywhere in the house or even outside (though it was cold enough to snow) and they are almost silent in their movements.  We had hide boxes and heating pads and water bowls and a few rodents scattered around hoping to lure him out into the open but had seen no trace or hint of him though we had turned many a room inside out and upside down.  Then I heard a thud in the laundry room.  There he was, behind the washing machine, bumping against the drying rack which had made the noise.  I can't quit smiling, silly snake!, but we're very happy he's back where he belongs, though it might have been an interesting way to keep the in-laws out of the house?  Jesus spoke of the lost coin and the lost sheep, but we had the lost snake, I never thought I'd see the day where I missed a snake!