SORRY, GOD, I HATE YOUR MOSQUITOES

And so begins the official season of the great American picnic. Only please count me out....!

I admit this is completely counter-culture, but I wonder if the culture is all that right in the first place? Just because outdoor grill and hot dog sales depend on this time of year, who is to say picnicking is actually what Chicagoans were meant to do between Memorial Day and Labor Day? I mean, where in the great cosmic code is it written that people should leave the comforts of air-conditioning for the risks of nature?

People like me grant that the sight of a happy family picnicking along the great green lakefront has its charms. But remember, people like me are looking at them from an insect-free, air-conditioned car on its way to a nice insect-free, air-conditioned restaurant. You see the point...?

Now I've researched this thing, so I come to it with facts not only feelings:

* Fact -- It has taken our species millions of years to evolve from out of caves and into homes with electronic kitchens that can do whatever we command. How logical is it, then, to turn my back on such marvels for the quirky whims of an outdoor fire that I had trouble making as far back as to my failed career as a Boy Scout?
* Fact -- Talking about fire, when Prometheus first stole fire from the Greek Gods, is it really reasonable to presume this epic theft was for such purposes as grilling wieners in Lincoln and Jackson Park? I think not!
* Fact -- When God said in Genesis what He had created was "good," I still have this heretical question: Did that mean mosquitoes too? Now wait, this is no trifling matter. Actually it's all part of the eternal how-can-a-good-god-permit-evil question. I for one have decided bugs were not the best part of the divine plan. And so no picnics for this heretic!
* Fact -- Lately we have been advised by science that our environment is in danger. Most of the time these experts point to ozone layers far into the atmosphere or giant glaciers far to the Arctic and Antarctic. I've been duly impressed and am duly concerned. At the same time, I ask myself why should I contribute to environmental problems by littering and messing up perfectly pristine landscapes? In deference to Al Gore, I refuse to further pollute our world. What's more, now that the children are gone, I no longer have to pretend picnics are fun!

And so I, one lonely mosquito-hating Chicagoan, stands before the jury of history and says: I have but one life to give to my Park District. I intend it shall be in the form of my grateful pride not my grubby picnics