Barking Gators
A couple nights ago, I read this post on Rob’s Site about “barking†alligators, and it literally gave me the chills. It’s no secret that I am scared shitless of alligators, which, of course, means that my fellow bloggers don’t miss an opportunity to send me pictures of big gators, pictures of groups of gators, pictures of gators on people’s front porches and in their back yards. Hell, someone even sent me a picture of a mondo alligator swimming around with a big-assed deer in its mouth!
When they’re not sending me pictures to gross me out or scare the dogshit out of me, they’re sending me stories that typically deal with some poor bastard being dragged into a goddamned river by an alligator and presumably eaten.
However, none of the disgusting pictures of these vile creatures or the Some-Poor-Bastard-Got-Eaten stories had the effect on me that the story of the barking alligators did. I cannot shake the thought of being alone, in total darkness, in some damned woods or the Everglades and hearing alligators but not knowing where they are. I’ll bet I could write a great story about just that. The problem is, by conjuring up and dwelling on the mental picture sufficiently to write the story, I would scare the shit out of myself.
If anyone decides to write it, please don’t send it to me.
Barking alligators … in the dark … Damn!
BRRRRRRRRRR
That’s like barking spiders, right? Not a big problem if you don’t light a match.
Comment by Sluggo — April 12, 2006 @ 11:25 pm
It’s more of a grunt than a bark. Besides, it’s the ones you don’t hear that you have to worry about.
Comment by rita — April 13, 2006 @ 7:24 am
Yeah, they sound kinda like pigs. Jim, if you’re ever out for an evening stroll, and suddenly hear strange grunts coming from the shrubbery, it could be several things, depending on your location. If you’re in Jersey, it could be a wounded wiseguy. If you’re in Florida, horny gators. In Beverly Hills, a male celebrity. You see the problem.
Comment by dogette — April 13, 2006 @ 8:43 am
If you’re in Washington, D.C., it could be Ted Kennedy.
Jim-PRS
Comment by Jim — April 13, 2006 @ 8:47 am
Woof.
Comment by Ken Adams — April 13, 2006 @ 3:58 pm
Jimbo, If the gators (barking or not)aren’t scary enough, there are Burmese Phtyons with diameters that rival telephone poles slithering about in South Florida.
Comment by Bill — April 13, 2006 @ 6:56 pm
I swear this to be true… on a quiet summer night, you can hear the gators barking from my back porch.
Comment by Bou — April 13, 2006 @ 11:38 pm
They bark when they’re HORNY, Jim. That OUGHT to scare the shit
out of you, if they’re barking at YOU…
Comment by Acidman — April 14, 2006 @ 1:50 pm