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whitepolaris · 1 month

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Hogzilla-or Hoaxzilla

A unique legend was born in 2004 when Hogzilla hit the scene. This story of this awesomely huge hog is rife with rumor, speculation, and, of course, the pithy remarks of Georgia's homegrown characters. Did this twelve-foot-long, half-ton pig with nine-inch tusks really exist? Heated arguments run both ways.

The tale originated at the River Oak Plantation, a preserve in southwestern Georgia where wild pigs are hunted. One day, owner Ken Holyoak repeatedly saw an enormous hog running around the preserve. He alerted Chris Griffin, a hunting guide, and told him that if he ever saw the porker, he should shoot it. In June, Griffin got the big pig in his sights and killed it in a single bullet to its no-doubt enlarged heart. Why did they kill it? According to Holyoak, they didn't want to take a chance of it getting away and another hunter taking down this record-breaking swine and getting all the praise.

Using a backhoe, Griffin and Holyoak excavated a giant grave on the property, then tied a rope around the critter's back legs and used the machine to hoist the carcass off the ground. They photographed Griffin standing alongside his trophy before burying it beneath a shady oak and respectfully marking its grave with a large white cross.

Copies of the photograph soon began circulating around the nearby town of Alapaha, population 682, in Clinch County. Next the AP, local and national newspapers CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, and many other outlets picked up the story. Someone also posted the photo to the Internet, prompting a flurry of traffic and commentary:

"A piñata! Who's got a stick?" -Turtleknee "Man, talk about 'bringing home the bacon.'" -mike2k1

No doubt about it: Hogzilla was getting itse fifteen minutes of fame!

This tale of the master porker revived Alapaha's spirits, given that the town's only previous claim to weirdness had been a crippled Bigfoot spotted limping across the road several decades earlier. The town, which holds a festival every year with themes like God Bless America and Salute Our Firemen, honored the big pig by christening the November 2004 celebration the Legend of Hogzilla. The festival came complete with Hogzilla T-shirts, floats, barbecue, sausage, and a hog-calling contest. (Thankfully, good taste prevented them from crowning a Hogzilla Queen.) Holyoak, invited to ride on the float, said, "If I'd have known all this, I'd have had him stuffed and put on roller skates." The festivities were so grand that they threatened to eclipse another famous Georgia festival, the Big Pig Jig, an annual barbecue cookout held farther north, up I-75, in Vienna.

Despite all the hoopla, however, skeptical folks started to weigh in. Why hadn't Griffin and Holyoak stuffed the hog, mounted its hundred-pound head, or thrown one hell of a barbecue? In their defense, the two men said they believed the meat from this overgrown hog would have been inedible, and slaughtering it would have been too monumental a task. Also, the animal was too big for conventional mounting; according to Holyoak, it would have taken someone with experience in mounting elephants. He also said that the head, which was about the same diameter as a tire from a compact car, was too big to mount on a wall. One Internet pundit complained, "Seems like he would have at least kept the tusks." Another wrote, "Now don't get me wrong, I love pork, especially wild pork. However, this story and how they buried it quickly smells like pig poo!"

Suspicious though it may seem, this was not the Holyoak family's first brush with bizarre-beast notoriety. Decades earlier, Ken's father, J. H., was out driving his pickup inspecting his cattle when he spotted a large, motley-looking feline pursuing a calf. The thing looked mostly like a panther, he said, but it had a long flowing mane like a lion. When Holyoak peppered the bizarre beast with a round of bird shot, the "panlion" skittered away into a wooded swamp and was never seen again.

Given the Holyoaks' penchant for spotting strange creatures, what are we to make of Hogzilla? Is it an elaborate hoax-or the real McCoy? Perhaps no one said it better than another Internet wit who saw Hogzilla's photo: "God Bless Georgia and the freaks she frees upon the world."

#weird georgia #type read

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tcmpcral · 4 years

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1. FIRST NAME: masha.

2. STRANGE FACT ABOUT YOURSELF: my father’s birthday is the day before mine :v

3. TOP THREE PHYSICAL THINGS YOU FIND ATTRACTIVE ON A PERSON: i mean, i’m asexual and aromantic but aesthetically i guess i could say the quintessential. roman?? nose for some reason fjfeka; i just like the look of them lies down also certain kinds of genuine smiles get me right in the heart. dark eyes are also very nice. or perhaps i should say like. when someone has dark eyelashes?? i think that’s it. also i’m always reminded of a girl i went to ireland with who had a seriously endearing case of doe eyes, and i’m still not sure if her eyes were just naturally that shape or if she used makeup to get that Look but either way i thought she was extremely pretty the whole time lmao the fact that she was also very sweet and thoughtful didn’t hurt either

4. A FOOD YOU COULD EAT FOREVER AND NOT GET BORED OF: rice and eggs fjjfiea; eggs in general, tbh. possibly also noodles. and dumplings. cheesecake. lotus paste. smoked cheeses hhhh sALMON. sweet potatoes. maybe pears and apples listen i’m sorry i love food, there can’t be Only One

5. A FOOD YOU HATE: hominy fjfkda; cauliflower. uhhhh also tuna casserole blegh. asparagus jfjkf;da oh YEAH I HATE BOLOGNA TOO i can’t. i can’t do it hhhhghg. and yet i love vienna sausages and deviled ham...

6. GUILTY PLEASURE: whispers taking the long way home so i can spend more time listening to the radio and singing along with it probably lmao

7. WHAT DO YOU SLEEP IN: whatever i wore the previous day fjfjiea; I’M SLOPPY

8. SERIOUS RELATIONSHIPS OR FLINGS: technically neither, but i guess i’d take flings over the other

9. IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN THE PAST AND CHANGE ONE THING ABOUT YOUR LIFE, WOULD YOU AND WHAT WOULD IT BE: lies down i do kinda wish i hadn’t dropped out of high school. on that front, it’s worked out in the end, but. still. it would have been nice to have kept up with my friends orz on a different front, i’m conflicted about it, but. sometimes i wonder how much better my life might be today if i’d gone straight for nursing instead of getting an art degree ._.

10. ARE YOU AN AFFECTIONATE PERSON: i. think i can be

11. A MOVIE YOU COULD WATCH OVER AND OVER AGAIN: yeah it’s still the kung fu panda trilogy lmao. but also tokyo godfathers, shutter island aaand. idk jurassic park? tremors? a good chunk of the x-men movies bc i’m not very picky with them and there’s things i like about most of them?? thinking emoji oH there’s also that movie push from 2009. the one with chris evans :v

12. FAVORITE BOOK: a little princess, war of the worlds, uhhh on the beach, house of stairs, the secret garden. i was once weirdly attached to this book i read in jr. high called where the lilies bloom. i also loved heidi uhhh. see, there were all these obscure books i read in late elementary school and jr. high that i loved that i often have trouble recalling rip. like there was one called eva, and another called home before dark. one named belle prater’s boy. the crystal garden. sweet sassy tree hhhh almost anything written by robert cormier ahaaa

13. YOU HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO KEEP ANY ANIMAL AS A PET, WHAT DO YOU CHOOSE: i’m honestly very happy keeping dogs as pets, but i’ve always wanted to. like. idk, maybe pet a wolf or a fox or other wild canid. i’d also like to maybe have a cat someday. and parrots and other birds are adorable and i love them, but. oof. they just seem. Intimidating pets. maybe someday i can have ducks or geese again, tho. oh, and. i’ll admit i’ve always been amused at the thought of having a pet goat, bc my grandmother apparently did as a child lmao

14. TOP FIVE FICTIONAL SHIPS [IF YOU ARE AN RP BLOG, YOU CAN USE YOUR OWN SHIPS AS WELL]: oh boy there’s. a Bunch. let me think... i. still have a very big soft spot for germany/italy hhh. uh. i hope the rest of them don’t have to be canon bc..... yeah. anyway still attached to beerus and whis... wheezes and both euroshipping (kaiba/bakura) and what’s apparently called stormshipping now (fubuki/manjoume). and ok i have to go with another hetalia one bc i’m such a sucker for france/russia lies down i was also once a big lex/zex shipper, and i still have a soft spot for. what it once was. not entirely too comfortable actually shipping it now since i haven’t Kept Up with kh and i’m not 100% on zexion/ienzo’s age anymore squints

15. PIE OR CAKE: ....whichever one cheesecake falls under :v

16. FAVORITE SCENT: ohghfjfkda there’s A BUNCH. aloe vera, bleach, lysol, sweet pea, tea, tires, sawdust, cucumbers and melons, ginger, beer

17. CELEBRITY CRUSH: yeahh, i still don’t really have one but. i do have a lot of affection for weird al lmao

18. IF YOU COULD TRAVEL ANYWHERE, WHERE WOULD YOU GO: whispers i would love to go to russia some day, but i think everyone knows that lmao. i’d also love to revisit ireland, especially killarney and blarney castle. and i’d love to revisit sorrento. and possibly italy in general tbh aaaa. i’ve also always kinda wanted to visit china 6_6

19. INTROVERT OR EXTROVERT: pretty sure i’m an introvert, but i also happen to be one who really loves crowds

20. DO YOU SCARE EASILY: i’m a. very jumpy person kffja; also certain topics Disturb me way more than others, and ngl i have something close to an Actual phobia of the dark rip

21. IPHONE OR ANDROID: i’ve never had an iphone, so probably android

22. DO YOU PLAY ANY VIDEO GAMES: animal crossing. also tetris when i’m bored. i love puzzle games like poppit and bejeweled lmao i used to play kingdom hearts and super smash brothers, and i miss them both tbh. i also played crisis core, two star fox games, and the world ends with you at some point. and uh. a handful of legend of zelda games when i was a kid. my favorite game is probably majora’s mask :v

23. DREAM JOB: comic book creator orz or some kind of concept artist for animated movies. but. i’ve come to terms with the fact that i’m not really. Good(TM) enough for that, so nowadays i’m much more interested in something more mundane like nursing. as long as it’s night shift, i want it

24. WHAT WOULD YOU DO WITH A MILLION DOLLARS: SO MUCH. get my car back in shape, pay off my grandparents’ house probably, go back to school fINALLY, move out lies down there’s so much i could do with that money lmao

25. FICTIONAL CHARACTER YOU HATE: there. aren’t any tbh lies down the most i usually get to is feeling neutral toward a character lmao except i just remembered umbridge exists so she might count

26. FANDOM THAT YOU WERE ONCE A PART OF BUT AREN’T ANY LONGER: not counting the ones i keep coming back to, there’s uhhh. gundam wing, star wars (waaaay back when the phantom menace was first released lmao), digimon, x-men evolution. i was in the MCU fandom for like a month before i lost interest XD;; i might count yugioh and yugioh gx as part of this, but. i’m still kind of invested in those tbh

all of these i’ve just kinda fallen away from thinking emoji i’ve never really had a bad fandom experience, so. you know

#;dash games #long post #i'm #such a windbag #lies down

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favvnsongs · 7 years

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i know you're feeling a bit poorly and i wish there was more i could do!! love you~

It’s almost impulsive, the way he asks.

It’s… nighttime. The hour doesn’t seem to matter as much anymore–Alicia had a watch for a while but Chris hasn’t seen it in days. They get up when the sun is bright enough and stop when they can’t see the road in front of them anymore. Sometimes when the moon is bright enough they go a little farther.

But it’s nighttime, and they’re eating cold beans out of a can that Alicia bashed in with a rock. They sit back to back and pass the can after every other bite, scooping with dirty fingers and spitting out the shards of the lid that chipped into the sauce. Travis and Madison went to find water, or maybe fuck, or maybe just die in the dirt like everyone else they’ve ever known.

“Let’s go,” he says, absently.

Alicia goes to hand him the almost empty can. “You gotta pee?”

“No. I mean.” He scrambles to his feet, dropping the can to the side without another thought. “Let’s… let’s go.”

Alicia points in a mostly random direction. “But–”

“They don’t care about us.”

Alicia’s face goes flat. She throws the last water bottle at him. “Go fuck yourself.” She lies down, curled into a little ball. There’s no fire tonight and he can see her shivering. Chris hesitates, looking out at the horizon.

“They don’t care about us,” he repeats, but he lies down and scoots until their backs touch.

She wakes him in the morning. There’s fresh water in dirty plastic bottles and he drains half of one before passing it back to her. “Food?”

She shrugs.

They spend the day sitting on crumbling concrete, watching the birds. In the distance of the scrubby desert two figures stagger, dragging steps. Alicia twirls her knife but they disappear into the horizon.

Chris goes through his pack and finds vienna sausages, cold and slimy and dripping weird smelling water. He thinks about starting a fire but it’s too much work.

Alicia shakes her head when he offers her the can. He eats them, one at a time, methodical and mechanical until they’re all gone. Then he walks a hundred yards away and throws up into the shoulder of the freeway.

Alicia hands him a water bottle when he returns. “Let’s go,” she says, abrupt, looking off down the road with her hand to shadow the glare of the sun away. “Let’s just… let’s go.”

“Okay,” he says. They leave half the food and water behind and carve a note into the dirt with a stick.

They follow the highway. Sleep tucked up against the concrete dividers and take turns being the big spoon. It’s scorching during the day and freezing at night, and Chris doesn’t notice they smell like sweat anymore.

“Do you think they care?” Alicia asks him, snuffling into his shoulder and her arm slung around his waist. “Do you think they’re following us?”

Chris shrugs. His neck itches where his hair tangles against it, far too long, and she gently smoothes it out of the way. When she sleeps her breath ruffles against his temple, tickles across his cheek.

They find gum at a rest stop and split it one stick at a time, which helps him count six days before they run out. They eat a hostess cupcake in front of a fire and Alicia declares it their anniversary. It’s his turn to be the big spoon but she shakes her head and slips behind him. Murmurs his name and kisses the back of his neck and slides her cold hands into his boxers from behind.

He bites his lip and his chest heaves and he whispers ‘oh’ just before his toes curl. She wipes her hands in the crabgrass and bites his shoulder while he dozes. In the morning she frames the bruise with her fingers and looks darkly pleased; every time they eat she suckles it again, until it’s tender aching and faintly bleeding. Every night before he’s allowed to come she presses at it until he yelps and shudders, helpless in her hands.

It’s almost impulsive, the way he asks.

Nick makes him eat, pressing cans into his hands and staring at him. After it happened Chris refused for days, until Nick tackled him down and sat on his hips and pushed bites of beans into his mouth while Chris tried to bite him. “We had a dog once,” Nick says, his hand dusty and painfully tight over Chris’s mouth. “Do I have to rub your throat to make you swallow?”

Chris didn’t speak to him for five days. When he breaks it’s silence his throat feels like Nick’s hand, rough and dry and oddly callused. “Let’s go back?”

Nick is packing up the water, pretending he can’t hear.

Chris says it again, louder. Firmer. “We have to go back.”

Nick exhales. “Chris,” he tries, almost gentle.

Chris sits down in the middle of what used to be the road. He puts his head between his knees and his hands over his ears. “We have to go back, we have to go back, we have to go back we have to go back–”

“–go back,” he’s whispering, his throat dry and cracked and hoarse. “We have to–”

Nick drops him into the dirt with an angry noise, panting from the effort of carrying him. “Fine! Fuck!” He turns, kicking a rock. “Fine!”

It takes a week to get back. Nick talks constantly. It’ll be too hard to find, he says. There’s no more water left that way, he says. And at night, when Chris is asleep, please don’t make me do this, he says.

“This is it,” Chris says. The pile of rocks is undisturbed–they’d dug for a full day, haunted by the thoughts of coyotes digging her up. Wrapped their palms in strips of her shirt and used rocks but their hands are still tender a full two weeks later.

Nick stares at where he buried his sister. He remembers when she came home from the hospital. The squint of her eyes and the soft tiny wisp of hair on her head. His first memory, touching a finger to her pudgy cheek and the wonder of how much love he could hold in his chest. “This is it.”

They burn her on the third day, in the moonlight. It’s harder than Chris thought it would be. The cheap ugly pile, the best pyre they could make from scrub brush and twigs, keeps going out. The smoke is heavy and oily and they take turns throwing up. She doesn’t burn all the way through and Chris wants to stay and try harder, but it’s been hours and hours, the day turned to night again, and Nick is touching his shoulder. Their clothes smell like the fire, and her, and smoke, and death and blood.

“Please,” Nick says, and his voice cracks. “Chris, please. Please let’s go.”

They walk for another two days before they stop again. It’s a rest stop and they scrub at themselves in the bathroom, where the plumbing still works. Nick bends him over the sink and scrubs at his back, making him shiver and prickling goosebumps up his spine. Nick kicks his legs farther apart and Chris shivers again for a different reason, head bowed obediently, but Nick washes the back of his neck roughly and tells him to get dressed again. Chris stays bent over and Nick slams the door on the way out.

Chris goes to his knees before Nick on a picnic bench. Breath coming fast, uncertain hesitant eyes. Nick cradles his jaw, slips his hand through Chris’s hair and scritches gently at his scalp. Hooks a clean thumb in Chris’s mouth and tugs it open. Chris’s fingers shake when he undoes Nick’s zip. Nick smiles, gentling. “Do I have to rub your throat to get you to swallow?” he asks, and Chris holds his hands behind his back while Nick guides his head forward and eases inch by inch into Chris’s throat, until black spots dance in Chris’s vision and his drool drips down into the dust.

Chris opens his mouth to ask and Alicia kisses him. Nick rolls his eyes and throws a handful of beans at them, making Alicia shriek when they land in her hair. Nick shoulders his pack and pinches Alicia’s hip when she pouts Chris into carrying hers for her. “Don’t be prissy, Licia.”

She makes doe eyes at Nick and he sighs. Carries all three packs and Alicia hops on Chris’s back for a piggyback ride. “Tonight,” she whispers in his ear. “You think?”

Chris blinks. “Tonight what?”

“Ssh,” she says, impatient and exasperated and flicking his ear. “Don’t spill our plan.”

“It’s not our plan if I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Nick turns around from where he’s a bit ahead of them. “Stop conspiring.”

“It’s not a conspiracy,” Chris protests, while Alicia giggles into the back of Chris’s neck. “I don’t know what she’s talking about either.”

Alicia wakes him while Nick is taking a piss. “It’s time.”

Chris rubs at his eyes. “That’s ominous.”

She straddles him and he forgets his entire vocabulary abruptly. Takes his hand and guides it up over her shirt and he marvels at how soft she still is, warm and faintly curved and rocking her hips when his thumb brushes over her nipple. “Do you want to touch me?”

Chris licks at his dry mouth. “I–I was going to ask–”

“Ask to touch me?”

“No to–to, uh–”

Nick sighs at them, returning. “Over the shirt, Christopher? I know you’ve got more game than that.”

Alicia turns to smirk over her shoulder at him. “We’re waiting for you.”

“You never wait. Brat.” Nick sits next to Chris and bumps shoulders, companionable. “What were you going to ask?”

Chris is quiet for a moment and they let him think, Nick’s arm around Alicia’s waist and her fingers tapping absently on Chris’s shoulders, the flex of her thighs on his hips. “For you not to leave,” he admits. “For you to take me with you.”

Nick and Alicia look at each other. They kiss feather light, eyes open like it’s the first time. “I’m no good at promises,” Nick says, hoarse. “Okay?”

“Okay,” Alicia murmurs. Nick scoots behind Chris, easing his back down into Nick’s front, legs stretched out on either side. His hands rest lightly on Chris’s hips.

His lips press dry under Chris’s ear and Chris shivers. “Touch her,” Nick murmurs, and they all moan together, the same low pitch.

#god bless alie for the fucking blessing she is t b h #<333333333 #fucK #submission

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constructionfirm · 6 years

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ATAS Monsters of Metal Canstruction® Awards

The ATAS Monsters of Metal Canstruction® team recently received the Best Meal award and the Best Design award (also known as “Juror’s Favorite”) in the recent Canstruction® Lehigh Valley competition.

One of seven teams building Cansculptures® this year in the Lehigh Valley, team members consisted of ATAS employees and the Architectural Studio. This year’s theme was “Comic-Can”, and teams were challenged to build structures related to comic book characters. The Monsters of Metal created an eight-foot tall Batman comic book for their Cansculpture®. The front and back covers of the comic book portrayed the team name and Batman image. Inside the comic book, the Bat Signal was projected over Gotham City, alongside the Batmobile emerging from the Bat Cave. The Cansculpture® incorporated several varieties of vegetables and beans, along with Vienna sausages, tomato sauce, and olives, to create a colorful, as well as nourishing, display. A total of 6,624 cans were used to create the structure. A time-lapse video of the ATAS Canstruction® build can be viewed at www.atas.com/videos.

The jury for the competition consisted of community leaders, including Whitehall Mayor Ed Hozza, Second Harvest Food Bank Director Jessica Dokachev, Lehigh Valley Mall Manager John Ferreira, and Architect Steve Glickman.

This is the third year that ATAS has participated in this event; they have been involved since its inception in 2015. New Tripoli Bank was a sponsor of the Monsters of Metal team this year. John Hayes and Michele Hunsicker of New Tripoli Bank attended the awards ceremony, held at Second Harvest Food Bank on October 24th, to support the ATAS team and to help them celebrate.

A grand total of 41,027 cans were used by the seven teams competing, an 8% increase over 2016, and a 71% increase over 2015. Nearly 51,000 pounds of food were donated from this year’s event (at a value of approximately $36,000) to Second Harvest Food Bank.

In the team photo (top to bottom, left to right): Glenn Hechler, Jason Eberts, Andrew Webber, Shirlann Wilkinson, Cindy Galiszanski, Julie Wheeland, Kevin Klersy (team co-captain), Anne Hicks, Dylan Repsher, Janet Grazul of The Architectural Studio, Patrick Reinhart (team co-captain), and Chris Grover.

About ATAS International, Inc. Founded in 1963, ATAS International, Inc. is a leading manufacturer of metal wall cladding, roofing, ceilings, perimeter edge metal, and accessories. The ATAS portfolio features an expansive selection of products available in aluminum, steel, zinc, stainless steel, and copper. Standard profiles include narrow and wide ribbed wall panels, corrugated styles, standing seam and batten seam roof systems, metal shingles, shakes, tiles, and more. Additional options include curved, tapered, and perforated panels; concealed or exposed fasteners; smooth or embossed textures; horizontal and vertical applications; and a choice of over thirty stock colors with PVDF finish.

With sustainability at the forefront of modern building design, ATAS proudly supports green building objectives with high performance solutions, such as solar-ready roof panels, insulated metal panels, ENERGY STAR® qualified cool roofing products, and solar air heating wall panels. The ATAS team consists of product and market specialists that provide a high level of support for your project, from initial discovery and design to installation.

ATAS has four ISO certified manufacturing locations in the United States: two in Allentown, PA, including the headquarters; Maryville, TN; and Mesa, AZ. Learn more about the ATAS product line, service offerings, and continuing education programs: www.atas.com | 610.395.8445

About Canstruction Canstruction® is a unique charity art exhibition and event featuring structures made by teams of volunteers, youth groups and/or Canstruction contractors. The structures are made entirely out of full cans of food. At the end of the exhibitions or events all food is donated to local hunger relief organizations. Some Citywide Can Art Exhibition participants compete against one another in the Canstruction International Competition to win titles for the best structures. Recognized for commitment to art, innovation, and hunger relief, the art exhibitions and events have helped raise over 50 million pounds of food to local foodbanks since 1992.

About Second Harvest Food Bank Second Harvest Food Bank’s mission is to obtain food and distribute it to people in need through local non-profits and to provide resources for education and advocacy to end hunger. Second Harvest is a program of the Community Action Committee of the Lehigh Valley (CACLV) and a member of Feeding America, the nation’s Food Bank network and largest hunger relief organization.

#construction

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whitepolaris · 2 years

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Hogzilla-or Hoaxzilla

A unique Georgia legend was born in 2004 when Hogzilla hit the scene. The story of this awesomely huge hog is rife with rumor, speculation, and, of course, the pithy remarks of Georgia’s homegrown characters. Did this twelve-foot-long pig with nine-inch tusks really exist? Heated arguments run both ways.

The tale originated at the River Oak Plantation, a preserve in southwestern Georgia where wild pigs are hunted. One day, owner Ken Holyoak repeatedly saw an enormous hog running around the preserve. He alerted Chris Griffin, a hunting guide and told him if he ever saw the big porker, he should shoot it. In June, Griffin got the big pig in his sights and killed it with a single bullet to its no-doubt enlarge heart. Why did they kill it? According to Holyoak said, they didn’t want to take a chance of it getting away and another hunter taking down this record-breaking swine and getting all the praise.

Using a backhoe, Griffin and Holyoak excavated a giant grave on the property, then tied a rope around the critter’s back legs and used the machine to hoist the carcass off the ground. They photographed Griffin standing alongside his trophy before burying it beneath a shady oak and respectfully marking its grave with a large white cross.

Copies of the photography soon circulating around the nearby town of Alapaha, population 682, in Clinch County. Next to the AP, local and national newspaper, CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, and many other outlets picked up the story. Someone also posted the photo to the Internet, prompting a flurry of traffic and commentary:

“A piñata! Who’s got a stick?” -Turtleknee

“Man, talk about ‘bringing home the bacon.’“ -mike2k1

No doubt about it: Hogzilla was getting its fifteen minutes of fame!

The tale of the master porker revived Alapaha’s spirits, given that the town’s only previous claim to weirdness had been crippled Bigfoot spotted limping across a road several decades earlier. The town, which holds a festival every year with themes like God Bless America and Salute Our Firemen, honored the big pig by christening the November 2004 celebration the Legend of Hogzilla. The festival came complete with Hogzilla T-shirts, floats, barbecue, sausage, and a hog-calling contest. (Thankfully, good taste prevented them from crowing a Hogzilla Queen.) Holyoak, invited to ride on the float, said, “If I’d have known all this, I’ve have had him stuffed and put on roller skates.” The festivities were so grand that they threatened to eclipse another Georgia festival, the Big Pig Pig, an annual barbecue cookout held farther north, up I-75, in Vienna.

Despite all the hoopla, however, skeptical folks started to weigh in. Why hadn’t Griffin and Holyoak stuffed the hog, mounted its hundred-pound head, or thrown one hell of a barbecue? In their defense, the two men said they believed the meat from his overgrown hog would have been inedible, and slaughtering it would have been too monumental a task. Also, the animal was too big for conventional mounting; according to Holyoak, it would have taken someone with experience in mounting elephants. He also said that the head, which was about the same diameter as a tire from a compact car, was too big to mount on a wall. One Internet pundit complained, “Seems like he would have at least kept the tasks.” Another wrote, “Now don’t get me wrong, I love pork, especially wild pork. However, this story and how they buried it quickly seems like pig poo!”

Suspicious though it may seem, this was not the Holyoak’s family first brush with bizarre-beast notoriety. Decades earlier, Ken’s father, J.H., was out driving his pickup inspecting his cattle when he spotted a large, motley-looking feline pursuing a calf. The thing looked mostly like a panther, he said, but it had a long flowing mane like a lion. When Holyoak peppered the bizarre beast with a round of bird shot, the “panlion” skittered away into a wooded swamp and was never seen again.

Given the Holyoaks’ penchant for spotting strange creatures, what are we to make of Hogzilla? Is it an elaborate hoax-or the Real McCoy? Perhaps no one said it better than another Internet wit who saw Hogzilla’s photo: “God bless Georgia and the freaks she frees upon the world.”

Hogzilla

by Theresa Pugh

It is true, I believe,

In beasts of yore.

That which is now a bird,

Once stood as dinosaur.

Unknown creatures exist,

In the depths of the ocean.

There are things in the jungle,

Of which we surely have no notion.

Now there is talk up in Georgia,

About a hog that went wild!

They are saying, he grew,

Ten times normal size!

I have seen the picture,

But it doesn’t quite convince.

I need a tuck or a hoof,

Some more solid evidence!

But seems they buried him,

The minute they took him down.

The truth lies in Georgia,

And it lies deep underground.

They all him Hogzilla,

Say he was nothing but mean.

But as a pig lover,

Don’t know that I believe!

They say he is no Babe,

And if he makes it to Hollywood,

He’ll be the hog that ate Los Angles.

Not a pig that proved . . . he just could!

I am analyzing that photo.

And carefully standing my ground.

‘Cause if they really grow that big,

I don’t wna tthem in my backyard!

#weird georgia #type read

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