I used to know a guy who had an 18ft reticulated python. He owned a herpetology shop in San Bruno which supplied zoo's as well as private owners, so he dealt with some really big snakes. My girlfriend and I at the time owned a 6ft red tailed boa we'd bought from him, and he'd invite us over from time to time to handle the larger, docile snakes, like his 14ft albino burmese python.
So one day we were over there and he announced it was time to clean the reticulated pythons cage. As mentioned, these things are notoriously foul tempered, so we expected him to use snake sticks, gloves, restraints or some sort of special equipment.
We could see the snake becoming excited and agitated as he approached its cage, armed only with a magazine.
He swung open the door, wacked the snake over the head with the magazine before it could begin to strike, and as the head recoiled from the blow he seized its body coil and hauled it out of the cage in one fluid motion. Then he whips out the snake sticlk and corrals it into another cage.
Definitely one of the most amazing feats of animal handling I've ever witnessed.