I grew up in the Chicago suburbs, a checkerboard of cultivated lawns and respectable houses. It’s a pleasant place and there’s a lot of grass, but when it comes to animal wildlife, there’s little to be found but small birds, squirrels, and chipmunks. Not exactly zootopia.
One of the wonderful surprises of living in New York City is that this “concrete jungle” is actually teeming with animals! Just this weekend, in the course of life in the city, I encountered any number of interesting little critters.
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Here is a resident’s report on each of the animals I saw.
- Half Rat: I took my eight-year old to the schoolyard across the street to shoot some hoops and enjoy the weather. Little did I know that we would have a genuine encounter with the animal world! There are two common varieties of the half rat; the one we saw was a “bottom.” While it can be found across the city, half rats appear to favor the wide-open schoolyards of Upper Manhattan, right in the middle of a basketball court.
- Big Ass Hawk: Funny enough, this bird (Buteo bigassicus) can also be found lurking around the schoolyards of Manhattan. We spotted the big ass hawk in a tree above the court, staring down at my son and the half rat. Big ass hawks are incredibly intelligent species, and they show a pronounced curiosity about small mammals. Some day, ornithologists might even learn why.
- Rat (Other Half): I’m sure you’ve seen those adorable videos of dogs who are best friends with pigs—that’s exactly the deal with hawks and half rats! We caught the big ass hawk, clutching the “top” variant, heading out of the tree, flying away, looking for a quiet place where they could play and be best friends forever.
Well, that’s it! Except for the coyote that may be haunting our apartment building— some residents think it might just be an especially large house cat.
Nature! You truly can’t get away from it.
And now here’s what we published online last week on twofiftyone.net
NEW THRIFTY PUN, NOT YET
Thank you for that cartoon, Chicane.
And while we are sad to see him go, Jon Savitt’s “I’m taking a social media break. Seriously. For real this time. Probably.” leaves a strong closing impression:
Due to recent circumstances, I’m taking an indefinite break from social media.
I will be signing off after I post this one last message to Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Snapchat, Goodreads, Badreads, and Eh-reads.
Of course, there may be certain instances where I just very quickly check in. For instance, if AOC is going viral or if there’s a new HBO show I want to talk about.
But other than that, you will not hear from me. At all. Maybe once a day. Twice tops. But nothing more. And that’s a hardline.
I’m out of here. Gone. Vanished.
Obviously I’ll still be on TikTok, but that’s neither here nor there.
It’s time to relax, reflect, rethink.
Sure, if it’s an emergency and you absolutely must reach me (or you just want to say “hi”), my Twitter DMs are open and closely monitored.
Thank you again for your understanding. This now concludes my social media break.
It’s so good to be back.
And, there’s more!:
- If you like cats and think “tell me about yourself” is an inane interview question, you might very well love Kyle Duggan’s piece. Thanks, Kyle!
- Pat Cassels was back with “A No-Stress Valentine’s Day, Spent Alone.” Not so complicated, folks.
- T. Kent Jones replaced a bunch of football players with chatbots for the post-game interview and, guess what? Nobody noticed.
And now, our advice column returns with a question from a reader.
Dear Existentialist,
I’m very close with my sister and her husband, but am increasingly concerned with some of the choices they’re making as parents. Their daughter speaks to them with incredibly harsh language, calling them “stupid” or “idiot”—they just let it slide. I think this is setting their child up for disaster down the road when she encounters adults who are less forgiving. How do I bring this up to my sister without hurting her feelings?
Susan from Glencoe
***
Dear Susan,
If you can get some distance from the problems with your sister—how long do you think the human race really has?
Consider this: every species eventually goes extinct. Even if our nuke-building, AI-releasing brains somehow stave off the horrors of species-level catastrophe for some time, so what? The sun’s wired like a bomb. Any memory of your niece will go with it.
If you tell your sister what you really believe about her parenting, she will die. If you don’t, she will also die. This is just an observation, not advice. Tell your sister whatever pleases you to say.
From the long view of the universe, there is no good. There is no evil. There is freedom. There is choice. There is your sister and her husband, their little girl. One day, quite soon, you’ll all be gone. Choose wisely.
Oh god,
The Existentialist
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