We Need to Fight the Groundhogs

Dear Reader,

Truthfully, over the past few days, I’ve been overcome with emotion regarding a certain holiday in this past month of February that surprisingly has little to do with the fact that I’ll probably celebrate Valentine’s Day by myself forever. Rather, it has much to do with furry, overgrown groundhogs that live in dirt and the tiny creatures’ smug supremacy. As much as the animal connoisseur I am, with my constant attentiveness to my tank of possibly radioactive glow-in-the-dark fish, I cannot wrap my head around why we humans would rely on an underground rat that quite literally lives under a rock to tell us when to debut our new fur boas and recycled paper straw hats in the spring sun. 

Naturally suspicious about Punxsutawney Phil’s obsession with winter, I started researching online to find out the reason behind the hype, only to be distracted by a 30-minute-long ad for Red Bull. Sadly, 24 minutes in, I was properly convinced to purchase two six-packs of Red Bull, but what can I say? I’m just a person who’s that invested in improving our economy.

 But wait, what are the chances that my attempt at digging up dirt on magical weather rodents is foiled by another internet-famous animal—one that even gives you wings?? Don’t look at me; that’s what the ad said. However, this had me wondering if the only reasonable conclusion to this was that Groundhog Day was a larger scheme hosted by a network of magical animals to overthrow us humans?!

Call me crazy, but how else would, for instance, the death of a large green owl have that much influence over us humans? These animals have been playing with our emotions, and more importantly, our wallets. Who would need to buy Puma jackets and Charmin’ toilet paper in  spring when we could simply frolic in clover fields while reenacting the very natural lives of our ancestors? When we had been worrying about inflation’s impact on ourselves, we should’ve been paying attention to the animals who had been affected and consequently turned to manufacturers to outcompete human brands out of spite. Learning how capable these animals are, I might just have to protect my isotopically unstable fish behind a paywall or whatever trendy gatekeeping tools people use, pronto! Might I also need to replace my newfound Red Bull addiction with something tame like Celsius or maybe even pendant-sized bottles of mercury. I’m sure mercury would look fabulous around my neck with my fur boa. 

Although you may still not be convinced (which I fully understand because how is a land animal supposedly going to give me wings?), I was always pretty sure I was always more aerodynamic than a cow. But in order to fight for free speech in fashion and weather predictions, I will not be bowing my head to these commercialized animals. If there’s one thing you take away from this, let it be this: we need to be on guard at all times. Who knows how much of an advantage groundhogs already have with their 30-minute-long ad censorship. Maybe they’ve already hacked into your AI boyfriend ChatGPT’s code to increase their weather prediction accuracy rates, but that shouldn’t stop you from gaslighting the bots into a toxic relationship. If you fight back against these animals, not only would you be able to show off your furry fashion accessories, but your love life would also bloom with the increase in early spring predictions. 

Down with the groundhogs!

Ready for spring to start,

Someone who needs to feed their genetically engineered fish.