Bad Neighbors!

A couple of months ago somebody in Orlando lost their King Cobra! What!? You heard me. Their cobra! It wasn’t called a pet, and the person who lost it had a permit to have it. Let’s stop right there! Why would someone be issued a permit to have a cobra that did not have “zoo”, “university life science department”, “world anti-venom laboratory” in their name or title, instead of just “crazy”! Oh I know that “crazy” isn’t politically correct. Don’t really care! You keep cobras in your home you have earned the moniker! You lose that cobra and I’m going to ramp up that moniker to “insane”!

Over the weekend I read in the paper about a Asian Monocled Cobra on the loose. This one near Ft. Myers! Are you kidding me!? How many people are harboring these serpents in their homes? Hasn’t anyone heard of a dog, cat, hamster even?! You want something exotic go with a chinchilla, perhaps a sugar glider. All good choices.

King cobras pack enough venom in one bite to kill 20 people or one elephant. Since the United States is decidedly short on elephants, I’m pretty sure who is drawing the short straw. The Asian monocled cobra is somewhat less nasty. Its bite will take 60 minutes to kill you, but kill you it will. Just how much cobra anti-venom do we have on hand here in the U.S.? One would think with these two incidences happening close to each other in time and space here in Florida, we might need to know!

Cobras don’t make good pets and they make worse neighbors. The first cobra was on the lamb for more than a month. Kids at the local school weren’t allowed to play outside for two weeks. It was finally found by an unsuspecting woman in her garage doing laundry. She heard a hiss coming from under the dryer. A good argument for dry cleaning. The second cobra was found more quickly. It only took a couple of days. He was spotted about town a few times before he was captured behind a garbage can next to a house. In both these cases the owners had permits to have them, but they failed to notify authorities immediately upon noticing they were missing. Seriously? How about we send all cobras home. Not to their permitted home, but to their Thailand, India, China, southeast Asia home. They like it there. I like them better there. I’m not a fan of these snakes, but they are just being themselves…snakes. I ask you, who is the really bad neighbor here?

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