In the wilds of suburbia there is a tiny stretch of forest. Trapped and fenced between ribbons of concrete this tiny preserve thrives. Through this tiny preserve is a path. Suburbanites wander path in their jogging gear or alongside their canine companions.
One unexpected thing about this small stretch of trees and ponds is the abundance of wildlife. Ducks and geese are everywhere. They're common in Illinois anyway. There might even be deer and the occasional coyote. What I didn't expect to see was evidence of a beaver. Quickly I snapped a picture. I was giddy at my find. "Wow! There's a beaver left in Illinois!" I thought.
Then I turned to the internet for knowledge. What I found out left me both excited and deflated. You see, beavers are so common that they can be considered a pest animal. According to the Illinois Furbearer Guide there is even a beaver trapping season.
What excited me was their size. Beavers are 40 to 50 pound rodents. Do you have a 4 year old laying around? Go look at them. That is the size of a beaver. They are huge rodents with huge teeth... In your backyard. Enjoy.
Once upon a time there was a woman who needed to tinkle. This woman dashed into the ladies room, dropped her trousers and took a seat on the magic pot. When she looked up she saw a sign that read "Ladies let's please protect ourselves and wipe the toilet seat after use with clorox wipes. Thanks!" She turned to the sink and there they were, ready to protect her ass from the potty gremlins.
The first question she asked her self being a wise princess was... "Is there really a disease people can transmit via the toilet seat?" The second question she had to ask herself was... If someone had the plague, wouldn't it be wiser to wipe the seat before use? After all if us ladies need to protect ourselves what would be the point of bleaching the seat after the germs were already wearing holes into our butt cheeks?
Curious, the princess went on a quest. She looked to the great and wise internet to find the answer to the first question... What can you catch from the magic pot? The response was... nothing. This was both according to the CDC and WebMd.
The next day at work the princess asked her coworker about the sign. Her coworker's response was, "someone was piddling on the seat." The young woman once again asked herself, how on earth does this happen? In answer the princess was faced with a sad truth. The women who were the most afraid of catching potty gremlins were the ones causing the problem.
The moral of this story is: If nobody hovered, nobody would have to.
Can I take a minute to complain about the weather here in Chicago? I know, everyone’s a critic, but there’s a reason that some people continue to deny that whole global warming issue and that’s because places like Chicago exist. You know you’ve made it when you get your own Wikipedia article. Snowmaggedon, the Snowpocalypse, or the Groundhogs Day Blizzard of 2011. Call it what you will, to me, snow is just additional proof that God hates us and wants us to get the fuck off this planet.
The snow started innocently enough, as far as snow storms go. Work calls me after about an inch has landed. They say the same thing the TV and radio jerks have been saying all afternoon: this is the big one. To back that up, they offer hotel rooms to any of us scheduled to work the next day. I say, heck, why not? Beats watching the snow fall on Clark Street.
I took my time, finishing my chores and doing some work at home, by which point this shit is getting serious. Just to prove it snows in hell, Lake Shore Drive is completely shut down, with hundreds of motorists stranded in the snowy waste land. I arrive at the redline, only to find out that it too had been shut down. So back on the bus I went. It’s now 8PM and the city is a literal ghost town of white shit. I get a private bus ride all the way to the blue line in Jefferson Park.
Hiking my way through the treacherous parking lot to the hotel, I feel like Mad Max if the desert had been a plain in Antarctica. It’s clear to me how easy it would be to die ten feet from your own door if you can’t see it, what with all the ice spitting into your eyes. There’s also this weird roaring noise, and the occasional lights flashing from the sky. It’s not planes from O’Hare, since those were grounded hours ago. That’s right, folks. Thunderstorms. Snow-belching, bone-quaking thunderstorms.
Alas, I arrive at the hotel too late to indulge in a hot tub, but I do enjoy some late night TV and gossiping with a work friend before calling it a night. Time and a half and a close encounter of the freezing kind. The next day, I get paid time and a half and eventually make the trek back home, walking down the center of Clark Street, which is about the only plowed street in the whole damn city. And yes, it only took me 15 minutes to unearth my car the day after, by backing it out of its snow cave into my neighbor’s freshly dug space. And leaving it there. Put a chair in that space, bitches.
