If you're waiting for the comments here, just go read the article. It's that good.
> A sign on the front desk warns against tapping on the snakes’ enclosures: IF YOU KNEW THAT THE ONLY THING STANDING BETWEEN YOU AND DEATH WAS A PANE OF GLASS, WOULD YOU RISK BREAKING IT? This is not P.T. Barnum-style hyperbole. One day I was taking flash photos of an apparently pissed-off cobra (she was waving menacingly about, hood flared), my face as close as my camera lens would allow, when she finally had enough and struck at me, hitting the glass. I had the delayed jolt you get right after a fender-bender—did that really just happen?