It's wicked to mock the afflicted

cultural observation number 453/i:

The stonework of Tuscany is littered with little black lizards very much like the southern United States. The difference is no generation of Italian children seemed to have recognised the entertainment value of getting the little creatures to bite your ears (it doesn’t hurt and they don’t let go) causing them to dangle like earrings. At this suggestion, each native I spoke to was surprised that this was a possibility. Upon my recollection of my own childhood, this was the immediate conclusion when I discovered the lizard’s nature to bite and hold on tenaciously.