Except for Big Al

Gator stories are plopping out onto the national scene like burrito wrappers out the windows of Michael Moore's stretch Escalade.

Where do I start?

How about this: the Post Office has come up with a new alligator stamp. It was officially dedicated yesterday in a ceremony "on the edge of the Everglades," i.e., in a perfectly ordinary suburb between Fort Lauderdale and Miami. Some guy from the Flamingo Gardens botanical garden and wildlife sanctuary was there, and he was asked to bring a baby alligator, which had the highly original name "Gator Joe." Personally, I wouldn't have bothered inviting this guy. I would have walked over and plucked a gator from the nearest ditch.

I'm against the alligator stamp. I'm against anything that puts violent images in the disordered minds of postal workers. I think we need stamps with photos of clouds and ducks and warm fuzzy puppies and kitties on them. Or how about stamps showing photos of the families of other postal workers? You could caption them, "Don't do it. They have children."

Hey, here's an idea:

It's kind of fitting that the Postal Service would have a stamp featuring a fat, sluggish, stupid animal that takes a huge bite and rarely moves except to kill something.

Here's proof that real news is slow in coming these days. Click the link and read the thrilling story, "Residents Say Ditch Has Alligators." It comes to us from Winter Haven, Florida.

Here are some typically weird quotes:

"Gators travel at night like they're the ones who pay taxes instead of us," said Ruby Thomas, who lives on Palm Drive Northeast.

"The alligators walk the area at will," said Hattie Wilson, president of the Northeast Neighborhood Association.

Hasn't ANYTHING happened in July in Winter Haven? Is life in Florida really this dull? I better keep my eye on The Miami Herald; I may be in there soon. "Steve Contemplates Scratching Backside; Reluctantly Concludes Effort not Justified."

The obvious mistake the locals are making is going to politicians for help, more than a month away from an election. You don't go to politicians and cops and so on and ask them to clear out the gators. You go out at night, kill the gators yourselves, have a barbecue, and when the authorities and politicians finally show up to pretend they care, go "Gators? Here?"

I'll tell you a secret about law enforcement types. They don't care if you break the law, as long as they don't know about it. They just want their free fast food and their pensions and doughnuts, so kill your own gators and keep it on the down low. It's all good.

In Hilton Head, South Carolina, a seven-foot alligator lying in the road was run down by a car.

I'll give you ten seconds to guess the sex of the driver. Men can be stupid about things like washing their sheets and picking their noses while driving, but only a woman can accidentally run over a grown alligator. "Accidentally," I say.

Says the story, "The woman that was driving the car that hit the gator is okay but the gater was badly injured and had to be put down."

"Gater"?

Of course the woman was okay. But her cell phone fell and got nail polish remover in the earpiece and had to be destroyed. Fortunately, EMTs kept her on life support while they rushed her to a Cingular store for a life-saving transplant.

If a woman can run down a huge green reptile in broad daylight, what chance do you and I have? We have to do something to make ourselves more visible. Like taping really expensive shoes to our foreheads. That will get their attention.

You want proof that journalists are lazy morons who only leap into action to cover stories other people have already found? Here it is. The Winter Haven gator epidemic has been written up in in Tampa. The story is almost as boring as the original, but the quotes are better. Here you go.

Melinda McArthur, Palm Drive Resident: “Oh they big, they real big. ”

Also:

Melinda McArthur, Palm Drive Resident: “I don't like reptiles. I don't like anything that might be faster than me.”

I think we need to send Melinda a Segway. Although speaking as a Republican and former scientist, I am loath to interfere with the process of Natural Selection. Anyway, she would probably just ride it back and forth to the liquor store. Or straight to the liquor store and then in lazy circles terminating in a nearby hedge.

I think I'll close with another "Big Al" item. Remember "Big Al"? No, not South Park's "Big Gay Al." No, not "Big Al," the guy who owns the chain of stores where I pay good money for dirt to fill my aquarium. Big Al the Largest Captive Gator in Texas. According to Gator Country owner Gary Saurage. Who, I'll bet anything, hasn't measured any other alligators.

It turns out Saurage may have a pretty decent trademark-infringement suit. Because some flake in California is touring with a gator named "Big Al." Only this "Big Al" is four feet long.

I would suggest an alternative name. Such as "Puny Al." Or "Big Al Lite." Or a tribute to Native Americans: "Little Big Al."

Here's the odd thing. Little Big Al is part of an event called "Rainforest Experience." That would be fine, if alligators came from rain forests. But they don't. Unless someone has snuck around and planted a rain forest somewhere between Miami and Brownsville.

This is a fraudulent deal all the way around. Big Al is small. The "Rainforest Experience" features an animal collected in a culvert in West Palm Beach. The perpetrator ought to be dragged to a liquor store behind Melinda McArthur's Segway.

Okay, it's after twelve, which means it's time to quit writing about Thorazine and start taking it. But don't worry. The gators aren't going anywhere.