"YACOLT, Washington (AP) -- A man who was showing off for friends by kissing his new rattlesnake was bitten on the lip and nearly died.

Matt George, 21, was hospitalized in critical condition after the Sunday incident. By Tuesday, his condition had been upgraded to serious.

George had caught the rattlesnake on a recent trip to Arizona. Holding the 2-foot snake behind the head, he kissed it in front of his friends.

"I said, `OK, man, you're being stupid, put it away,"' recalled Jim Roban. "He said, `It's OK, I do it all the time."'

After the second kiss, the snake bit him under his mustache. He dropped the snake on the kitchen floor, and Roban killed it with his cowboy boot.

As they waited for an ambulance to arrive at George's home, his face began to swell.

"He said, `I'm going to die,"' Roban said. "I said, `No, you're not going to die, just calm down and relax."'

Sheriff's Deputy Steven Johnson said he watched in the ambulance as George became limp and his eyes rolled back in his head. George was flown by helicopter to a hospital in Portland, Oregon."