Dust in the wind....

I returned this weekend from hiatus, as I spent a week vacationing in the tropical location of Ipswich, Massachusetts and I come bearing bad news. The often imitated, but never duplicated Crocodile Hunter has met his end - and that end was the barbed, poisonous tail of.... a stingray??? I don't have a degree in zoology, but aren't stingrays basically floppy dinner plates with eyeballs? I can't think of the last time I've ever heard of anyone even being injured by a stingray, let alone killed by one. One report I found states that there have only been 17 documented stingray related deaths in this HISTORY OF THE WORLD. That's a long time.... and that makes it a pretty improbable and rare way to die.

As if that weren't crazy enough, here's a guy who not only stared the Grim Reaper in the eyes, but he grabbed it by the tail, stuck his thumb up it's butt and then engaged it in a death roll (While not for the squeamish, that video of an alligator performing a death roll will certainly give you a big rusty tin of appreciation for Mr. Steve Irwin if you didn't already have it). He did this on a daily basis, toying with hundreds of the planet's most dangerous species. If Fox created an America's Most Wanted for animals, hosted of course by John Walsh, I'd be willing to bet my allowance that the Croc Hunter had come face to face with 90% of the species that would be on said show and lived to tell a tale or two about it. So after all that, what's the one animal that does what none of these other bad-ass animals could do and managed to push Steve Irwin off this mortal coil? Ladies and gentlemen, I present you the stingray.... and something tells me the guy in this picture's not a trained animal handler


When my good buddy Alex Popcorn texted me to alert me of the tragedy, I laughed out loud at first. Not because I dislike the man and relish in his expiration, but because he was invincible. My laughter was shock induced! He was the Croc Hunter! He's had hundreds of snakes around his neck. He's had his hand on countless Crocodile tongues. He's probably even flicked a lion or two in the balls. I'm sure he's had a few close calls, but he always came out on top! If he was going to die, it wasn't going to be at the hands of an earthly creature. He was either passing due to natural causes, or getting hit by a truck... or so I thought.

Well as of September 4th, 2006, you can take that magic number of 17 stingray-related deaths and make it an 18. I watched a brief montage on the life and times of Steve Irwin last night when I was running on the treadmill and I'm not ashamed to admit that I got a little choked up. Here's a man who had such a deep passion for his work, he would literally spit with excitement during his show. He was an environmentalist, a family man, an animal lover and a philanthropist... not to mention, I know Alex and I will always chuckle our asses off at the thought of the old Opie and Anthony skit about him getting attacked by a one-eyed croc with a missing bottom-jaw. I also know that the tears I cry for the Crocodile Hunter and his family are not, in fact, crocodile tears.