A grand adventure ... or not

Well , Gin from Doe Hill Homeschool wanted me to share my story about the alligator bite . I wish I could say it was a grand adventure worthy of Steve Irwin or Jeff Corwin but alas it was not . I wasn't dredging muddy swamps for gators or gator wrestling or anything like that . Actually what happened was this ... Long , long ago in a time before I had crow's feet and silver streaks in my hair , I was a teenager . An adventurous , carefree 15 year old was I ! Oh well , moving on ... my Uncle Rick had a visit from an old Army budddy who for some reason brought a baby gator with him . I'm sure there was a reason , I just can't remember it . Well anyway , he wanted Uncle Rick to watch it for him while he was out and about enjoying the many fine attractions , that Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg had to offer . It was in an aquarium on the coffee table for all of us to enjoy , which we thought was great , having never seen a real live gator before . Well the buddy's enjoyment apparently was going to last the entire weekend because he didn't come back that night as I recall so it was up to Uncle Rick to feed the gator which of course meant my cousin and I would have to do it . Well grand adventurer I was , I volunteered , the gator wasn't quite as enthusiastic as I was about it though . Everytime I would get near the lid to the aquarium he would hiss and snap at me . Well , of course I was upset because he didn't act that way toward everyone else . My Uncle had even picked it up and held it for a long time without any problems . Everyone laughed at me and said the gator just didn't like me . To prove it they all put their hand in the aquarium and started petting it . Well , that of course kicked off my temper so I was bound and determined to show that gator who was boss . I picked him up (hissing back at him the whole time of course) and tucked his legs up under my arm so he wouldn't rip my arm open with his claws . I thought I had him pretty well subdued so I laughed at him and said a few smarty pants comments to him and low and behold  it jumped at my other hand and latched on to my finger . OOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWW !!!!!!!! Everyone laughing at me didn't help matters much . I 'm positive that gator was grinning and smirking when he finally let go . I put him back in his tank and gave him the "look" for several hours and reminded him how some people think gator is a delicacy . He and I just couldn't get along , all weekend long I tried to play nice and get near him but every time he would snap at me and sometimes even get close enough to bite again . I wasn't sorry to see that gator go . Sorry I could't offer up a mind blowing , swashbuckling adventure for you all . Hey wait a minute , there was that time I was bitten by that horse ...