Reptiles

snakes snakes snakes!!! Love them! My favourite is the mamba, that long, streamlined, shiny black death pipe!

with apologies to Oscar Hammerstein: Cobras and vipers and nasty puff adders Lizards that blow their face up with air bladders beaufiful coral snakes with colored rings These are a few of my scariest things Venomous rattlesnakes ground up for chili When beef's available, this seems so silly There's the black mamba that kills when it stings These are a few of my scariest things When the snake bites Neurotoxins Spin around my head If there's an antidote Give me it, please! And then I won't feel So dead!

Should have composed and edited it elsewhere. Here's a better version. Again sorry Oscar H. (Copyright 1999, John Burnett) Hissing pit vipers and nasty puff adders Cobras that blow their face up like air bladders beautiful coral snakes with colored rings These are a few of my scariest things Venomous rattlesnakes ground up for chili When beef's available, this seems so silly There's the black mamba that kills when it stings These are a few of my scariest things When the snake bites Neurotoxins Spin around my head If there's an antidote Give me it, please! And then I won't feel So dead!

Written by city boys, of course!

I wrote these lyrics all by myself, and I came from a town of less than 2000 people. I dealt with snakes until I left the mainland, but after having been bitten by the water moccasin, I've always been afraid of the poisonous ones.

Okay, okay, you got me! But you get paid like MILLIONS of dollars probably to come up with wise cracks; whereas I - nothing. That's why every second one is a groaner!

If I get paid millions, I'm being swindled by my agent! ;=) I wonder who Steve the Crocodile Hunter's agent is...

why?

John, love the poem and agree wholeheartedly!

Thanks, Gi. Ree, so I can get my million$!!! ;)

ha-ha! Yeah! And if you were a television host, you'd also have MILLIONS of people wanting to come and live in your house, and drink your water from those ugly little news mugs! Some people just have it all!

Yup! That's our John...*grin* (great poem, btw)

Two snakes were crawling along when one snake asked the other, "Are we poisonous snakes?" The other replied, "You're darn right we're poisonous! We're rattlesnakes. Why do you ask?" To which the first replied, "Because I just bit my tongue."

Deadly Viper Finds There's No Place Like Home TORONTO (Reuters) - Residents in a west-end Toronto neighborhood were breathing easier on Tuesday after police and Toronto Zoo staff tracked down an escaped deadly viper that turned out to be a homebody. The saw-scaled viper whose venom can kill a human -- was reported missing from a tank in its owner's apartment on Monday morning. Police evacuated the apartment building and issued warnings to neighboring businesses and residents. But despite the viper's reputation for being aggressive, the 45-centimeter (18-inch) snake stayed put, finding a warm corner in the apartment more inviting than the cool spring air outside. It was tracked down late on Monday afternoon, just one meter (3 feet) from its tank, nestled under a radiator. A 19-year-old man who owns 20 venomous snakes -- will be charged under a city by-law that prohibits the ownership of exotic pets. The fine is around $250 per animal, police said. ``You're not allowed to keep an animal like this in a regular residence,'' explained police Sergeant Niels Sondergaard. ``The antivenin was not (immediately) available so it posed an extreme risk to the public.'' Some antivenin, costing about C$10,000 ($6,730), was located in a New York hospital and flown to Toronto on Monday as a safety precaution.