Just about everyone has seen the viral video of the Florida Man who scoops up an alligator with his trash can and then lets it go back into the swampy area across the street from his house.
That epic piece of video deserves an equally epic ballad, and songwriter Jonathan Mann delivered.
“Florida man, Florida man, catch an alligator in a trash can, if you can’t do it, no one can,” goes the song, which has an infectious melody and clever lyrics extolling the virtues of the generic “Florida Man.”
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Mann told us via Zoom that he sees Eugene Bozzi, the man in the video, as somewhat iconic.
“Anytime I see someone doing something like that who, you know, automatically they kind of become in my mind like a folk here, they’ll tell tales of the legend of Florida Man, the guy who catches gators in his trash can,” Mann said.
Mann lives in Connecticut, where he literally writes a song every day.
“I actually have the Guinness world record for most consecutive days writing a song, it’s a record that didn’t exist before I did it, but now it’s a thing,” Mann said.
He’s often inspired by stuff that happens here.
“There’s something going on there between the rest of the country and Florida that is intriguing to me,” Mann said.
It’s unfair, I replied, but Floridians simultaneously resent the stereotype but also celebrate it.
“Right, and that’s sort of what I was trying to get at with the song,” Mann said. “It had a great story, just like from beginning to end of him doing it and then finding that he let it go, there’s sort of a redeeming quality to Florida man in that video.”
The Florida Man of the hour himself, Eugene Bozzi, was on MSNBC Friday afternoon.
“Netflix, give me a show, I’m ready!” Bozzi said. “I love animals, I didn’t ever want to intentionally, to hurt the animal so I’m glad it was safe and it went back, I’m glad nobody got hurt.”
Bozzi said he saw the alligator outside of his house in Mount Dora and had to improvise a way to get it away from his kids. He noticed the garbage bin and figured, this might work.
“I scooped it up and I delivered it to his natural habitat, I felt great about it,” Bozzi said.
It’s all celebrated in the song.
“You do things different down south, straight into the trash can’s mouth, go down to the swamp, let him out, come on now, Florida Man,” sings Mann. “Florida man, you’re much maligned, that’s the way our country was designed, but we need you, Florida Man, to catch those alligators in the trash cans.”
Listen to the full song below:
