Every once in a while a pure piece of content comes across a blogger's desk. It often involves an animal, occasionally a person, behaving or existing in a way that makes you go "wow." These items would not be out of place in the hyper-local community newspapers which have largely gone extinct in the country, but the mass distribution potential of the internet has created an ecosystem for them entirely (these types of posts combined with "cute pet videos," a slightly different subgenre, comprise the content of an entire website called The Dodo.) One thing I always appreciated about the sites in the greater Gawker universe was that they shared an appreciation for this type of blog, whose purpose was nothing more than to acknowledge and marvel at some occurrence of the natural world. There was no "news" value, per se, but the sheer fact that they provided momentary enjoyment to both blogger and reader was enough to make them worthwhile. Also, in the insane atmosphere of early corporate digital media, they also represented an extremely low-effort post that would probably get you some pageviews.

Thus, today's blog. Look! Big Gator:

Wow. What a freakin' monster. When I was starting this blog I went looking for another blog I remember doing about a Big Gator, because this is not an uncommon experience in Florida, but for some reason I couldn't find it in the Splinter archives so maybe it was for another site. There have been many gators over the years.

My girlfriend, who is from Florida, tells me that Big Gators are kinda all over the place. You're not supposed to walk a small dog near the swamp at dusk because the gators like to eat them, and then if you try to stop the gator eating your small dog they eat you too.

But mostly, when they're on golf courses, they're just hanging out. Even in a hurricane! Wow. The power that gators have. Look at the big one.