what's the big deal? lake michigan is always full of shit.

granted, it's a bit unusual for it to get dumped onto the heads of unsuspecting tourists but is that really so out of character for chicago? don't get me wrong, i love chicago but it is the city renowned for the cow with arsenist tendencies, for roads full of gangstas bootlegging when they weren't too busy shooting eachother full of bullets, for the infamously disgusting meat packing industry which served as inspiration for animal farm, and now for dumping shit on its visitors. why not?

seriously though, lake michigan, while it may be beautiful, is a teeming cesspool of human excrement and garbage.

have you ever seen children frolicking among broken bottles, used condoms, half-eaten hamburgers, and the occassional half-buried hypodermic needle? yes folks, that's right. it's just another day at north avenue beach. bring the entire family. and don't forget to tell your kids to shit in the water. it's so much easier than taking bathroom breaks after all.

ok, i may be exaggerating, but only slightly. very slightly.

i actually went swimming in the lake once. it was amazing. it was dusk, the sun was going down and my friends and i had ridden out to the waterfront on our bikes. at the time we were fueled by more than a little alcohol and youthful exuberance. hey let's jump in the water! fully clothed of course. sounds awesome doesn't it? and it was. swimming in the dark with the chicago skyline lit up behind us. it was pretty amazing. until the next day that is.

the next day i was again riding my bike along the shoreline and i noticed all of these little silver things floating in the water. i could see them from the corner of my eye for the entire ride from where i lived a few miles north of downtown until i reached the spot where i had gone swimming the night before. "what the hell were they?" you might be inclined to ask. well, you guessed it. hundreds and hundreds of dead fish. gross.


hi, i'm a dead fish


ok, these are the actual dead fish from that day. not as pretty as the first picture, huh? reality. who needs it. moving on...

unfortunately these fish did not appear to be recently deceased either. they were so dead that even the gulls were leaving them alone. if you are as familiar with the gulls of lake michigan as i am you will realize the significance of their refusal to partake of such an easy meal. shit, even the fish that like to peck out the eyeballs of their dead cousins weren't having any of it. not a single eyeball missing from any one of those hundreds of unfortunate little guys.


the normally voracious residents of lake michigan

now, i never found out what caused the mass extinction of the fish but it was not long after that the entire lake was closed down. i'm not really sure how you close down a lake as large as lake michigan, but the city of chicago did it. or tried to at least. the reason: an accidental overflow from the sewage treatment plant. i no longer remember the exact number of gallons that spewed forth into the lake, but it was an impressively large amount. large enough to close down the lake in the middle of the summer (also known as "lake season" in chicago).

the two incidents may or may not be related but i can tell you this with certainty- i was not one of the many recreation seekers who took to the water three days later when the lake "reopened" to the public. no sir. not me.