Chicago, not known as a jungle habitat, entertained itself for a week with reports of an alligator sighted in a lagoon in Humboldt Park west of downtown. To prevent public panic, the park district sent reptile experts to capture the interloper – but each one came up empty, while public interest grew and grew. The gator acquired a nickname (Chance the Zapper, from a Grammy-winning hometown rapper) and fans on social media, but the fearsome creature proved elusive. They finally sent for a gator wrangler, Frank Robb of Florida, where gators are a dicey, ever-present feature of the landscape. He came, he listened to the people, he visited the lagoon with his $10 fishing rod. Even baby gators in Florida know enough not to go for bait hanging off a fishing pole, but Chance was tired and hungry, so the mystery was where he was hiding. Robb surveyed the lagoon, then told the people to stand back and hold onto their loved ones. He baited his hook, tossed out a single cast and presto: one baby alligator, a mere five feet long and scared to death of all these people. Mothers breathed sighs of relief, children ran around the park in wild abandon, and afterward social media sat glumly hoping for a new diversion. Chance is in good health and will soon head to a zoo, where he has been promised a new lagoon that’s separated from the humans by a big, sturdy, chain-link fence. (Ashlee Rezin/Chicago Sun-Times)
The Daily Office 