Sea Snakes - Really?

"There are some 50 different species of sea snakes, and all of them are venomous. They thrive in abundance along the coast from the Persian Gulf to Japan and around Australia and Melanesia. Their venom is 10 times as virulent as that of the cobra. Humans bitten by them have died within 24 hours."

This from a friend's post on Facebook. As if I need yet another reason to avoid setting foot in the ocean. Sharks, jellyfish, stingrays, depth, salt and the movies "Castaway" and "A Perfect Storm" apparently aren't enough - now I have to worry about poisonous snakes, which are bad enough on land and almost certainly more nimble in the water.


It seems that there is always another surprising tidbit that comes across the wire that brings my fear of the sea to new heights - or depths, as it were. The ocean is nothing but trouble. Its tides, controlled by the moon, are as unpredictable as... well, as the tides. Its depths holds monsters, man-eaters and things that sting, yet we are drawn there by the shimmering of its waves in the sun and the pretty coral beneath the surface. Suckers, I say - immediately the lowest fruit on the food chain once we have entered its confines. We cannot breath beneath the waves, we are not equipped to swim quickly and we are bleeders - all of which define our place in the grand sea-scheme.

Now, we have snakes that inhabit the sea. Perfect.

Poisonous sea snakes - snakes even more poisonous than their landlubbing brethren. Lots more poisonous. I make it a point not to trust reptiles in general and even less those which have no legs or feet. Anything that slithers on the earth or in the sea should be avoided at all costs - time will bear me out on this one. It even states in the bible that serpents can't be trusted. I don't even believe in that book of fairy tales, but this particular piece of information makes perfect sense to me.

The ultimate irony here is that I have been awarded a trip to St. Thomas - apparently an island resort in the Caribbean, surrounded by ocean. I not only have my particular strain of skin cancer to deal with, but also my unconquerable fear of the sea to contend with on my trip. Will this stop me from going - I think not. I will be the one in the bar, slathered in 198 SPF sunscreen, wearing a beekeeper's suit, attempting to coax a mai-tai through one of those big straws.

I will also be the one keeping a tally on my peers who have been bitten, stung and devoured by the creatures of the deep - it's the least I can do.

I want a monkey.

I need to clarify this title. I want a monkey only if it will not or is incapable of eating my face off. And since I do not trust the "will not" portion of this caveat, I will settle for the following: "I want a monkey who is incapable of eating my face off". Whether this is brought about because the monkey, once it is big and strong enough to eat my face off is heavily drugged with a monkey-tranquilizer, or has been fitted with some handsome, but harmless, soft plastic monkey-teeth does not matter to me. In fact, once the chimp is big and strong enough to eat my face off, I will probably have stopped trusting it anyhow and manifested some sort of watchful paranoia in the presence of the animal, which would ultimately break the animal's heart and devastate the beast, who had come to love me, as much as an ape can love a man.

My fear of wild animals is well-documented. I have an irrational fear of many things - among them, in no particular order are: Circus clowns, wild animals in general, wolverines in particular, the sea and all creatures that inhabit its untrustworthy waters, children with two different colored eyes and certain types of wood. That all said, it is my theory that the animal kingdom is gearing up for a big takeover - all the news stories of bear-mauling, rogue schools of giant jellyfish, reptiles, big cats, kangaroos and fire ants all gone completely man-hungry simply serve to illustrate my point.

But that's not why I'm writing today. I watched a show on television this weekend called "Fatal Attractions". It was not the sassy Michael Douglas/Glenn Close suspense thriller I was hoping to watch - the fact that it was on a channel labeled "Animal Planet" should have clued me in. It was actually a show that offered up stories of "animal-hoarders", who stockpiled flocks, pits and packs of dangerous pets, often to the point of depriving themselves of living space, food, health and, as the title suggests, sometimes their lives. The show I saw featured a man who was eaten by his brace of giant lizards. I don't know that a group of lizards is called a "brace", but it sounded better than a "lounge" of lizards, which was my first instinct. The second show - yes, I watched two of them - detailed the last hours of a woman bitten by one of her great menagerie of venomous vipers. "What the hell?" I asked the television. What kind of dumbass keeps a bed of poisonous snakes roaming free in their shitty apartment? A DEAD dumbass, I answered myself, also aloud. I was shaken and disturbed and had to turn to a 1959's sci-fi movie whose plot had more holes in it than the carcass of the dumbass who had been eaten by his lizards. The fact that the movie had special effects by Ray Harryhausen made it easier to recover from the animal-hoarder show, regardless of the shoddy plotline.

I guess my point is this: Let's not bring wild animals into our homes. No lion cubs, no cute little monitor lizards, no wolf pups and sadly, no monkeys. These animals belong in the wild, where they can join their carnivorous friends in planning their takeover of the world. The weak and slow end up in a zoo - their peers appreciate them being removed from their ranks, it only serves to make them faster and stronger. The weakest of all are trained and used in the movies. I find it hard to believe, however, that they don't snap and chew somebody's face off now and again.

And a final note to those who make this "Fatal Attraction" television show: Knock it off, will you? You've already ruined my dream of owning a monkey I could dress up like a 19th century Italian immigrant and teach to smoke cigars. Haven't you done enough?