Here’s a quintessentially Alaskan story, courtesy of my sister’s friend, Michelle:
A few years ago, at a music festival held in the small (very small) town of Hope, Alaska, a problem arose with the Porta-Potty facilities. A collection of the portable toilets had been trucked into town for the dramatic increase in the town’s population during the festival.
On the second day of the festival, with the Porta-Pottys filled to capacity, the crowds became restless. A festival organizer took to the stage to announce that, as good festival organizers, they had anticipated waste management needs correctly and that fresh Porta-Pottys had been on their way by truck from Anchorage. Unfortunately, the truck had hit a moose en route, so fresh cans would not be arriving that day.
It’s a fairly common occurrence in Alaska for cars — and occasionally trains — to hit moose. And the results are generally not pretty, especially for the vehicles. When I was a child, living in Denali National Park, my family signed up on a list that offered free moose meat. All you had to do was wait your turn for a moose to get hit (or killed illegally). We shared ours with another family, butchering the moose and packing it away in the freezer. Road kill that feeds a family.
But I don’t know how I’d feel about getting a moose that was hit by the Porta-Potty truck.