Garden gnomes take to smuggling The garden gnomes looked innocent when they turned up in the mail, but Australia's notoriously tough customs officers gave them a good going over -- and found they were full of live snakes and lizards.
A total of seven snakes and eight lizards were found in the hollow areas beneath the typically pudgy and cheerful exteriors of three ceramic gnomes and in several pottery figurines sent from Britain, officials said Tuesday.
He said the reptiles had been put down because of concerns that they could spread disease.
This is clearly step 2.
Bah, step 1.1. Taking over Australia leaves you a lot of the way to go to taking over the rest of the world, even if (as Risk taught us) it is an almost unbeatable position to hold defensively.
I don't care what Risk taught you. Australia goes to Gene Hackman.
I knew that damn Travelocity gnome was up to gno good!
tsg: Tentacle
I can't imagine that any creepy-crawly sent from the UK to Australia would last two seconds over there. The native critters would do them in faster than the blink of an eye. Personally, I'm more worried about the international proliferation of garden gnomes.
Ever heard of the Cane Toad?
I suspect the Cane Toad is actually a long-lost Australian species that migrated to other areas of the world somehow; it fits in perfectly because it's poisonous, like everything else Down Under.
Funnel Web spiders, koalas, you name it.
You forgot about the dropbear.
I see the new SOAP sequel: Snakes In A Gnome. Samuel Jackson's character to be replaced by Gary Coleman.
I think my gnomish brothers were framed... cause we generally smuggle other things in our "hollow areas beneath"...
http://photognome.livejournal.com/205131.html
I'll have one without so much rat in it.
"Such criminal action is a cruel practice which frequently results in the deaths of animals in transit," said investigations manager Richard Janeczko.
He said the reptiles had been put down because of concerns that they could spread disease.
Sounds like the animals are safer crammed in a gnome's ass than at customs.
*shudder*