h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Lakeland, Florida -November 29, 2006

For reasons not yet fully understood, a naked 45 year-old man who had been smoking crack wandered into a swampy area near Lakeland at 4 AM last evening.

He was grabbed by a 12 foot, 500 pound aligator. Deputies wrestled him away from the gator, but not before the gator took a last grip on his buttocks.

The man lost a portion of his left arm in the attack and the gator has since been captured and euthanized, in accordance with State of Florida policy.

There are two excellent writers who formerly had crime beats on major Florida newspapers and who recognized that the absurd happenings in this State created a rich opportunity for a novelist to write humorous novels about murder and roadkill.

One is Tim Dorsey, formerly of the Tampa Tribune and the other is Carl Haissen of the Miami Herald. Each of these former reporters have a half-dozen excellent novels to their credit, all based in a Florida setting and chock-full of dark absurdities loosely based on real life.

The national news reported the damage to both arms but failed to mention that the gator bit him on the butt.

I'd a lot rather deal with possums and raccoons.

A 45 year old crack smoker. Lets see, he will be in the custody of the state now so the tax payers are probably going to be liable for his care and rehab. And the alligator has been captured and euthanized.

I probably am opening myself to all sorts of name calling and epithets here, but for the life of me I can not see why they did not let the alligator have the guy and then give him a medal for saving us the trouble of paying to keep him in prison for years.

Not a bad solution. My sympathy is with the gator.

Likewise.

You'd still have to deal with a gator that had developed an appreciation for easy-to-catch tasty humans.

I checked out the local paper (Lakeland was my home town for many years) and Lake Parker is more or less in the middle of north Lakeland. It's ringed with restaurants, commercial enterprises and swanky homes.

Phred, allow me to compliment you on a particularly well-wrought headline.

My next job could be with the National Enquirer..."Bigfoot Stole My Wife"