A Page From the Diary of Punxsutawney Phil

Looks like it's gonna be 6 more weeks of look-for-your-own-fucking-shadow (Image)

Saturday, February 2^nd, 2013

Dear Diary,

It’s here again.  It’s that day where they drag me from my home and grope me in front of everyone.

I’m starting to forget what things were like before they captured me.  For the first few years of my life I was a free groundhog.  I spent my days scurrying about, munching on berries, alfalfa, and maybe the occasional grasshopper if I was feeling adventurous.  That’s what us groundhogs do, we scurry.  Sure, that’s kind of a gay way to travel, but it works for us.  Besides, back in the day I used to pull so much hoary marmot tail that I got nicknamed the “Whistle-Pig.”  I never understood why they called me that, but it’s neither here nor there.  The take home message of this paragraph is that bitches love my scurryin’.

The day that they captured me is one that I won’t forget.  Gary, the last guy they captured to be Punxsutawney Phil, lost his shit one day and started demanding interviews with reporters from the jail cell they threw him in.  Long story short, the Inner Circle ran him down with a pickup truck, left a citation for jaywalking on his mangled body, and covered up the story in the newspapers.  These guys in the top hats don’t fuck around.  They swarmed me like sorority girls on jello shots.

I’ve been Phil for three years now.  Groundhogs don’t normally live passed seven or eight, so I’ve been getting more and more frantic in the past few years.  Nobody ever hears about the things that really go on in this town.  They drug me on a regular basis to make sure I’m too disoriented to escape, and they make piles of money off of me, of which I never see a dime.  Three years ago I tried making a grand symbolic statement when I left my burrow to give the yearly prediction.  The problem was that I shot a black groundhog thinking it was my shadow.  The theme I was trying to portray was “Winter is dead and life is meaningless”, but it ended up just being a hate crime.  They made me throw his body in the creek and promise never to talk about it.  I was listening to a lot of Panic! at the Disco back then.  I’m not proud of it.

The funny thing about groundhogs is that we’re actually very skilled prognosticators.  Back in July a doctor from Clearfield showed me pictures of six pregnant patients and asked me which of them would have premature births—I predicted that four of them would.  Technically, only two delivered early, but there was a miscarriage that I’m going to give myself credit for, and the fourth wasn’t even pregnant, she was just really fat.  I’m not going to point any fingers, but maybe it’s not the best idea to try to eat an 8-pound hamburger at Denny’s Beer Barrel Pub on a weekly basis.  Seriously, don’t you care that there are Giant Pouched Rats starving in Africa?  Selfish Bitch.

I can hear people gathering outside; they’re getting ready for me.  Well I’m not going without a fight this year.  It’s to the point now that I don’t even get to hibernate anymore.  You think your wife is cranky before she has her morning coffee? Try dragging a groundhog from its burrow when it should have been asleep all winter.  Honestly, that whole “seeing my shadow” thing is a recent change in protocol; we used to just declare six more weeks of winter because it was like hitting the snooze button.

One of the members of the Inner Circle just reached into my burrow; it’s about to get ugly.  I’ve been crushing PBR’s since yesterday and you bet your ass the local news is going to want to be on a tape delay—I swear like a sailor.  The truth is, my eyesight isn’t as good as it used to be.  At this point I never know if I’m seeing my shadow or if it’s just one of my blind spots.  Or, you know, a black groundhog.  But I think after what I did to LaDarius those brothas keep their distance, so my two choices are normally shadow or blind spot.  Either way, they don’t let me have guns anymore.  But I digress.

You know what, Diary?  I think I’m ready to make a stand.  I don’t really know what I’ll do until the time comes, but I’m coming out of this burrow swinging.  Us groundhogs have been kept in this meteorological slavery for too long.  This one is going to be for Wiarton Willie, and Shudenacadie Sam, and Val d’Espoir Fred, and Staten Island Chuck, and Malverne Mel.  But not Balzac Billy.  Fuck you, Balzac Billy.  You’re just some Canuck in a gopher suit.

Wish me luck, Diary.  I’m about to Chris Brown meets honey badger up in this bitch.

Punxsutawney Phil out.