One Over X News

February Second

For most of the country it is Groundhog Day. It is a silly sort of holiday; the excuse for a small town in Pennsylvania to be mentioned at least once a year on the national news. There in Punxsutawney is a groundhog named Phil and like the dog that portrayed Lassie in the movies and on TV, there have been many Phil's over the years.

When you think of Groundhog Day, some may remember a Bill Murray movie a few years back. In the movie Bill's character is trapped in Punxsutawney after a freak snowstorm hits the town and for whatever reason everyday that he wakes up after that it is Groundhog Day all over again. Having had the misfortune of being in Punxsutawney once, I could understand how some might consider that purgatory.

Anyway, legend has it that if Phil comes out and sees his shadow there is 6 more weeks of winter. Of course even if he doesn't see his shadow and there is an 'early' spring, in Pennsylvania spring like weather is usually six weeks away. Somehow I miss the point of the holiday.

Perhaps it is a shameless ploy for commercialization and gaining attention but it caused me to think. How could Florida gain more national attention, something other than getting pounded with a hurricane or two every month for a few months or the ceremonial counting of the dangling chads? Negative publicity like that is a bad thing for the state. I was thinking more along the lines of a state creature. Of course, the most prevalent creatures that I can think of in this state are palmetto bugs and vultures.

Now a palmetto bug is really just a big-assed cockroach that can fly. No doubt the name palmetto bug came from some genius at the Chamber of Commerce. Who in the hell would want to come here for a vacation if they knew there were three inch long flying cockroaches? Certainly the weather is usually nice here except for the aforementioned hurricanes but would the nice weather offset the fear of being attacked by a large flying cockroach? The real estate industry in this state, which is a major component of the economy, would collapse.

As for the vulture, I have a theory as to why there are so many of them in this state. It all has to do with the food supply. Don't get me wrong, I love old people but so do the vultures. I think the mass migrations of retirees may be attracting the scavengers.

So, finally I considered the animal for which this state is possibly best known, the alligator. That has some possibilities. Why, we could create a retention pond in a landfill that used to be a swamp and build a community around it, call it Gatorsville or something equally tacky. We could seed the pond with ducks. You don't even have to stock such ponds with alligators. They simply find them or materialize out of thin air - no one is certain.

Maybe a seasonal change could be prophesized by the ritual counting of the ducks. If a pond duck disappears, there will be an extra week added on to hurricane season. It's just a thought.

I don't know why I wrote any of this. Maybe it just has always seemed to me that the observation of Groundhog Day was silly. That the news media even covers it at all says a lot about how bored we are with life in winter time. Now that the powers that be have pushed back the Super Bowl into the first week of February, Groundhog Day finally has some competition. Competition is a good thing. I just hope that things don't spiral out of control.

What if Punxsutawney Phil starts to have wardrobe malfunctions on live TV?

E

posted by Unknown @ 8:19 AM