Alligator Hearts Garbage Truck

I kid you not.

This was my latest story for zootoo.com. An alligator at a Sarasota attraction called Jungle Gardens lets loose a bellow every time the trash truck makes a pickup at the park.

I didn't even think this was a zootoo-type of story. I sent it to my editor for grins and she wrote back telling me to pursue it.

Best of all, editors made virtually no changes to the text version of the story I submitted and the video version survived completely unscathed.

That means, of course, that if you don't like it, it's entirely my fault.



Feedback on ZooToo.com has been mixed. A lot of people got the humor but some did not. They felt sorry for the lonely gator. Alligators don't need playmates.

Perhaps I should have pointed out that this one came from an alligator farm. If she wasn't at the park, she'd be someone's wallet.

And from the small world department: Les Smith, the anchor who introduced this piece, worked for more than 20 years in Norfolk, Va, including the two years I worked there in the early 1990s. I wonder if he recognized my name as he read it.