I held and pet a freaking Mountain Lion!!! (with pics)

I used to help out as a big cat handler, lions, tigers, puma, leopard, and cougars, for a wildlife rescue ranch. Lots of fun, but,...you have to really be able to read small signs of predators ! I grew up handling wild animals, and wild pets. When I was young, back in the 60's, in idaho, up in the mountains, my dad was a professional bear, and cougar hunter. His hunting buddy was an Indian who also owned a trading post. He had a cougar that he raised from a cub. When I was introduced to him, he was mostly toothless, and so big, that when he laid in the back of a truck, his front paws, and head hung off the tailgate, and his tail thumped the windshield, and roof of the truck. When he purred, the whole truck rattled, but he was so docile, that they trusted him to sleep with his head in my lap. I've never seen a mountain lion that big again ! Now here's something some of you might not believe, but I did see a black panther, 10-15 miles outside of Jefferson City Missouri. It was only about 40 feet away, calmly strolling by the entrance of a cave, down a path, along a bluff, near the Missouri river. No, I've never seen Bigfoot, but I never walked through the woods with the same feeling of superiority again !!! My friend who was with me, and I tried to follow it up the ravines trail, but it just disappeared ! It didn't even acknowledge our presence. Total true story, and no, it was pure black, blocky headed, long tail, and no lightness to it's coat at all ! I thought it was a myth, but my friend said he had seen them before, by the current river, lower Missouri. Say what you want, I know big cats, that was a big cat, that I had never seen before, and it wasn't a jaguar, or leopard, or even a cougar, but a species of it's own !