What is the difference between a crocodile and an alligator?

Unravelling the mysteries of the crocodylia

 

1) Crocodiles are more TEETHY. In particular their fourth tooth from the lower jaw points up [scarily] whereas alligators’ do not. The reason for crocs’ teethy look is because their upper and lower jaws are the same size; in contrast, the alligator’s upper jaw is wider. This means that alligators’ teeth (generally) fall neatly from above. These are typical teethy crocodiles:

 

                 

 

 

Compare this to the tidy alligator jaw: 

                          

 

 

 

2) Crocodiles generally have a pointier snout. In other words, they have a huge ‘V’ shape (if you’re looking down from above). This longer pointier shape is weaker than the alligator’s and more adapted to eating fish rather than meaty mammals or other beasts. Basically, if you had to confront one or the other, you might have more luck surviving a crocodile attack. However, to complicate matters, alligators are far less likely to attack humans than crocodiles.

 

 

 

3) Salt glands. Salt glands? Yes, salt glands. Alligators, being of older ancestry, lack them, whereas crocodiles have salt glands which allow them to excrete salt water. This brings us on to the next point.

 

4) Alligators are generally found in fresh water. Swamps, lakes and slow moving streams. Their lack of salt glands mean the sea is unbearable for them. Conversely, it is possible to find certain types of crocodile in the sea.

 

5) Crocodiles are found all over the world. Alligators are found predominantly in China and the United States.

 

 

 

More trivia:

 

1) Alligators and crocodiles are part of a big family of similar looking reptiles called ‘crocodilians’. Therefore, next time you see an alligator-crocodile-type-thing it’s more correct to say, ‘oh look, there’s a crocodilian’.

 

2) There are 23 types of crocodilian.

 

3) A typical crocodilian dive under water lasts between 10 – 20 minutes. If in dire straits, they can last for a few hours.

 

4) Crocodilians carry their babies in their mouths.

 

                                

 

5) Crocodilians are older than dinosaurs. But are you surprised? Look at them. They shiver my timbers with an ancient horror.

 

6) Some crocodilians can last 2/3 years without eating. Phoaw.

 

7) An alligator’s brain weighs half a tablespoon.

 

8) You will only find crocodiles AND alligators together, living in the same place, in Southern Florida.

 

9) There are such things as albino crocodilians. Check out this albino alligator:

 

Facebook: why I deleted my friends and family

Shortly after Christmas of this year I made the bold decision to delete all of my friends on Facebook. Why? I hear you ask. Good question. Here is why:

Main issue, overriding EVERYTHING: my obsessive compulsive desire to check for notifications, at least every day (when I say ‘at least’ I really mean at least). I would take a waz and feel the need to check YET AGAIN upon my return. I had to ask myself: Why? – why do I have this persistent urge? It was sad but most of all worrying. I needed to take deliberate action against such fiendish obsessive tendencies. Friend deletion seemed a practical response.

‘Mils, why didn’t you just delete Facebook for a while?’ This is an oft-repeated question, and an oft-performed action by fellow Facebook haters. The simple answer is that deleting Facebook is not really deleting Facebook… to get Facebook back, all you need to do is log in again (a marginally more lengthy logging in, but logging in nonetheless it still is) and enter your password. Some of my friends change their password into something unknowable (general slamming and bashing of keys can achieve this), but again, the ease with which you can get a new password set up via a simple email link rather deflates the potency of this approach. Deletion has a permanency to it, and a delicious satisfaction… ‘goodbye you annoying f*****s’ may have exited my grinning gob as I systematically culled.

‘Mils, for what other reasons did you delete your friends and family?’ Well, quite frankly, my friends and family were pissing me off. I got into some grotesque arguments about the MMR vaccine, socialism, capitalism, the ‘entrepreneurial spirit’ (groan) and many other things. I couldn’t bare it anymore. I needed to delete said irritating individuals whilst not singling them out individually. A group cull is blunt and less personal. As a result of not getting into arguments, I have had time to do many more things, such as learn Poker Face on piano – a useful substitute, wouldn’t you agree!?

I’m kidding, I don’t really play piano… I just wanted to sound smug.

‘Mils, what else? Dish the dirt.’ Well, I also found some of the posts being left by some people really quite embarrassing on their behalf. This is the point where I begin to sound grossly misanthropic, but hey ho, I’m going to bash on regardless. Some people really don’t have an ounce of self-awareness, which in some cases is adorable, but at other times is greatly shocking. Piles of selfies, miserable self-help comments, terrible poetry, statuses That Are All In Capitals (even writing that made me shiver), superstitious ‘if you pass this on and send it back with ten reasons why you like me, sun will shine from your arse for 20 days’ kind of tosh was as amusing as alarming, and I decided to save myself the mixed bag of usually negative emotions it brought by deleting everyone.

‘Generation Share’ got to me on a personal level. No I did not want to see a holiday photo of Granny in Costa Rica. No I did not want to see a video of baby Fraser gargling Ribena. I feel some things ought to be private, and Facebook, which brings out the desire to show-off in practically everyone, even if on the sly, really erodes the dignity of personal moments. The narcissism that is so trenchant on Facebook, so plentiful, so drippy, so utterly normal, made me see the side of human beings I liked least, and in turn made me miserable for my lost idealism.

Above all, I was convinced Facebook made me no happier. I was convinced my connections were not really ‘connections’ but faces on a page, illusions of connections, stylised ghosts of people. You feel more connected, but ARE you? This has been talked about a lot, so I won’t go into it yet again, but in short: I felt like I wanted to get back to the grass roots of human communication. I wanted simplification and good old fashioned chin-wagging.

 

 

The smelly irony…

What drove me away from Facebook – principally, narcissism, my own and others’ – is now pulling me back like a helpless, feckless lamb.

I, the lamb (let’s run with this) is:

– missing out on events that were advertised on Facebook
– going to lose touch with some of the more peripheral university friends once I leave
– missing out on photos which I want
– I am unlikely to ring the peripheral friends. So, these people are seeping away… and will be lost, once I graduate. This is incredibly natural, and if I was as organic towards human communication I would accept this, but I’m finding it hard to swallow.

Hard Question:

Shall I get Facebook back?

 

Solution:

Get Facebook back (gasp) but for a reduced friendship group. Set a limit on friends at, say, 45 people. Be careful about who I add. Do not add retards. Do not stay friends with anyone I do not actually like or would not sit next to at dinner with a degree of interest involved. This will inevitably still involve offending some people who perceived our relationship in different terms, but bite that bullet.
2) Get an app which blocks Facebook usage more than, say, once every 8 days.

 

Or:

Accept the fact I miss out on things and take pleasure in the seclusion.
Accept the fact I will lose touch with most people after university.
Accept the fact I won’t see any photos taken of events with me and my friends unless I took them.

 

Fact:

All options sadden me in some way. The idea of having a radically reduced Facebook friendship group is, however, the best option.

 

 

 

Two weeks later {edit + addition to above}:

Keeping a ‘reduced friendship group’ on Facebook is nigh on impossible. Why? Because once you open the door to some, the little buggers come flooding back with requests…. If you’re conscientious and unwilling to be favouritistic comme moi, you can’t say yes to some and no to others. End result: Facebook is back. It dribbles inoffensively, even pleasantly, back. You remember the fun bits: the witty statuses, the silly photographs. It doesn’t have to be such a vehicle of evil.

 

Answer if I slip back to the Hater Stage:

Block everyone. Out of sight out of mind.

or:

get a life and stop bloody going on there so often. Find something new to care about that actually matters.

 

Therefore:

I am back to Facebook. I can’t live without it. Zuckerberg, you got me cornered. Organic life: sorry. New interests: enter.

 

END.