As titans clashed, many gave thanks for excaping the carnage

Thanksgiving Day is one of the most important holidays in the United States of America. For billions of Americans, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade is an integral part of holiday festivities, along with roast turkey, gatherings with relatives, and games of touch football on the front lawn. This year, however, the hundreds of millions of attendees and further billions of viewers on television witnessed a hitherto unknown spectacle, when the parade became the scene of a prolonged and violent battle between a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl and a buffalo-sized turkey.

A special Thanksgiving surprise: Turkor, the giant wild turkey

The turkey, known as Turkor, was first seen wandering along the parade route, but it is not known whether he intended to join the parade, or if his presence was accidental and coincidental. Witnesses reported first thinking the giant turkey was a "very realistic float" or a "robot", or "the best [expletive] Thanksgiving costume I've ever seen". However, it soon became apparent by the bird's behavior that it was in fact a real turkey. The beast, Turkor, did not attempt to eat any humans. He did uproot several small trees, however, and attempted to eat the tires of a truck pulling one of the floats, and killed between 3 and 1,945 people by accidentally trampling on them.

It was not the fake turkey that he was after...

As Turkor's gobbles, clucks and other noises melded with the marching bands and pre-recorded pop songs, however, a new and ominous sound joined the festive cacophony: a menacing growl that witnesses described as sounding something like "Rrrrrrrrrrrr". The grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl that had been wreaking havoc on both sides of the Atlantic was seen flying down the parade route. He barely paused to demolish between two and 49 floats as he flew towards an unknown goal.

Snoopy could not stand in the way of Owlus's Thanksgiving feast

As the giant turkey was wandering down the street, gobbling merrily as he walked beside the balloon of the beloved comic strip character Snoopy, the menacing "Rrrrrrrr" was heard again, and the snowy owl burst onto the scene. First, he tore the Snoopy balloon to shreds, raining the scraps down onto the shocked crowd, and then he seized the turkey and flung him into a nearby building, smashing it. Turkor, however, was not significantly injured.

"First, I thought it was supposed to be part of a Harry Potter float, you know, like a super-realistic Harry Potter owl," one eyewitness recalled. "Then when the owl and turkey got together, I thought the theme must have been 'Harry Potter is using his messenger owl to send Thanksgiving greetings'. But when the owl killed the Snoopy float and started fighting with the turkey, I realized the whole thing was probably unplanned."

Turkor's beak proved no match for Owlus's deadly wings

The two huge birds continued to move along the parade route. Turkor only rarely attempted to fly away, as each time he tried to escape the owl beat him down with his wings or talons. The turkey puffed out his plumage in an effort to seem more impressive, but the owl seemed unperturbed as he continued to swipe at Turkor, using his wings as weapons. One witness commented, "It was kind of like the owl was b***h-slapping the turkey."

It was not merchandise, but brutal action that they were bargaining for

Finally, the two gigantic birds stopped in front of Macy's, where they continued to do battle. The turkey made a last-ditch effort to defend himself, slashing furiously with his beak, but the owl sent him flying with a kick from his foot. He then leaped on Turkor and stabbed him several times with his talons, before flying off with his slain foe towards central park. Fortunately, the battle concluded in time to allow Santa to appear at the end the parade as scheduled.

Getting ready for the ultimate turkey feast

Having dispatched his foe, the owl flew to Central Park and enjoyed what may be the largest turkey ever consumed on Thanksgiving. He then flew off for points unknown, sure to rain mayhem and destruction on the unwary another time.

A beautiful panorama of fall colors, but all they saw was blood red.

Autumn is, for many people, the most beautiful season. As the summer leaves die off and turn vibrant shades of red, gold, and orange, millions of people worldwide, particularly in North America and East Asia, love to view the foliage, celebrate the harvest, and engage in outdoor activities. Across North America, however, the leaves were not the only things dying, after a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl launched a series of attacks on unsuspecting people enjoying the autumn scenery.

They never got to see the peak fall foliage

As the leaves were just beginning to turn in the Shenandoah Valley, a couple incorrectly identified as Thomas and Martha Jefferson asked a passing hiker to take their photo as they sat on a scenic overlook. The hiker unwittingly captured their last moments, as the grizzly-bear sized snowy owl suddenly burst through the trees and crushed them in its powerful talons in a scene eerily reminiscent of the owl attacks on couples in cars across the nation the previous spring. The hiker survived by jumping off the side of the scenic overlook, and although she sustained a compound fracture of one leg, she later said it was a small price to pay to escape with her life. "You expect to maybe encounter weirdos, vagrants, maybe rapists or psycho killers when you're out hiking, so I always carry mace," she said. "And there's always the possibility of an attack by a black bear or cougar or coyote, or some other predator, or a rabid raccoon. But I really wasn't expecting a giant owl to come out of nowhere and kill those people." The owl then flew along the Skyline Drive, killing between 24 and 19,876 additional people. Apparently neither romantic couples on foot or in cars, nor families, nor larger groups of tourists were spared.

Her first hunting trip could have become her last...

In New Hampshire, where the autumn was further along, the owl was also seen lurking around unwary hunters. In one incident, a 13-year-old had recently bagged her first deer, and was proudly showing the buck to her friends and family, when the owl appeared. The quick-thinking hunting party grabbed their guns and attempted to shoot the owl, but the owl was uninjured, and merely flew away after flinging one of their trucks into the forest and starting a wildfire. The 13-year-old hunter recalled, "Our bullets didn't appear to have any affect on the owl. I know we didn't miss, because it was right there in front of us. But they didn't hurt him. He just looked annoyed. I'm a bit disappointed, because that would have been a pretty cool trophy." Other hunting parties were not as lucky. Between 42 and 8,381 people were killed by the owl in the New Hampshire wilderness.

A father-son fishing trip that one would never forget, and the other would not survive

The owl was next seen in north-central Pennsylvania, where it encountered a father and son on a fly fishing expedition. The older man was decapitated by the grizzly-bear-sized raptor. "I can't believe this happened," said the man's son, a graduate student. "My graduate advisor was killed by a giant white owl at the beginning of the school year. This really gave me a hard time with my graduate studies, but somehow things were becoming ok. Then my father, who I didn't see for years after he abandoned my mother and me, came back from Germany or wherever he was, and said he was sorry for being a c***, and said we should go on a fishing trip. I used to wish to go on fishing trips with him, so I thought it would be nice. And then this happens -- again, killed by a giant white owl. The odds of this happening twice are absurdly small. I think maybe I am cursed. Why did this happen?"

The pale wings of death mirrored on a river of autumn gold

The owl then flew off to the northeast and circled down the Hudson river, where it was last observed about to smash a small rowboat in its talons before flying off, its white wings contrasting dramatically with the rich fall colors. Although the widespread nature of the owl's autumn carnage causes the total death toll to remain unclear, it is believed to be somewhere between 89 and 481,986 people.

Autumn is also a season that is celebrated in many Asian countries, such as China and Japan, but there have been no reports of the grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl in any part of Asia. However, with the association of Tokyo with strange creatures such as Godzilla, Gamera and Mothra, to say nothing of Japan's robot innovations, it continues to be unclear whether the appearance of the owl in Tokyo would elicit any special attention.

They went out for Trick or Treat, but all they got was Death

For billions of American children, only Christmas surpasses Halloween as a favorite holiday. However, the holiday will now forever be associated with carnage and mayhem of the genuine, not pretend sort, as the grizzly bear-sized snowy owl that has wreaked havoc on both sides of the Atlantic resurfaced in time to turn the beloved holiday into a nightmare.

An ominous sight in the distance

The owl was first spotted in suburban Florida, where a crowd of neighborhood children were gathering to take photos before going out for an afternoon of trick-or-treating. The owl landed amidst the crowd, and quickly became the subject of a number of photographs.

The snapping of a vicious beak would soon replace the snapping of photographs

A Florida grandmother who would only give her name as Mildred described the scene: "First, we were just taking photos, and then the big owl appeared. Everybody thought it was part of the Halloween celebration, so we started taking pictures of it too. The children just loved it. But then..." The eyewitness did not wish to describe the scene in her own words, but other survivors said that, as soon as people began to approach the owl, it seized several individuals in its talons and quickly devoured them, sparing neither man, woman nor child.

These trick-or-treaters were about to become the treats for something higher on the food chain

After killing between 578 and 76,152 people in Florida, the owl flew west, stopping at numerous suburban enclaves to slaughter at least 9,204 and possibly as many as 732,289 additional people, and backing up traffic on Interstate 95 for eight hours, and Interstate 10 for nine and a half hours.

The stroller parade was in danger of becoming a death march

As darkness descended and millions of undeterred trick-or-treaters stepped out in search of candy dressed as ghouls, ghosts, witches, goblins, Michael Jackson, superheroes, and other popular characters, the owl continued to rain destruction upon the unwary.

One parent living in one of the attack sites said, "I thought it [the owl] was somebody's Halloween decoration. Look It could have been a robot, or even some kind of suit -- I wasn't paying that much attention anyway. This was my daughter's first Halloween. We dressed her up like a little princess, and were all set to have a great time trick or treating. Of course, she's too young for candy, and my wife and I wouldn't pig out on the sweets she got, since we know better than that. Did you know that they use Coca-Cola to clean corrosion off car battery terminals, and blood off highways after accidents?"

At this point, another parent called him a sanctimonious ass, and they started getting into a shouting match and provided no useful information about the owl.

Will counter-owl training become the next law enforcement strategy?

The next day, police tried to piece together the evidence of the attacks. One thing that most witnesses described was the impression that the owl was initially part of some actual Halloween decoration or celebration, and then the realization that they were wrong when it started tearing people apart. The reason for the killing rampage is not entirely understood at this time. While between 862 and 4,895,247 people lost their lives in the attacks, only a very small number, perhaps a few dozen at most, were eaten. The overwhelming majority of the deaths appear to be for purposes other than feeding. Scientists, law enforcement officers and other experts are working on better understanding the motivation for the attacks in an effort to help citizens better prepare for the next incident involving the grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl.

The Last Gasp of Summer Became Their Last Gasp

In the United States of America, the Labor Day holiday is traditionally a day of rest, relaxation and parades, the symbolic end of summer and the start of fall. Tragically, as billions of hot dogs and hamburgers prepared to be roasted on hundreds of millions of grills across the country, nobody expected the day would end in carnage when a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl unleashed a campaign of destruction on barbecue parties across the nation.

He wasn't interested in sharing the bounty of the sea

The owl was first spotted flying westward from the Atlantic Ocean, where he began the day of doom by attacking boaters getting an early start on the day's festivities. A camera found on the blood-soaked deck of a yacht in Martha's Vineyard tells what is becoming an all-too-famliliar scene, of relaxed people enjoying life before a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl tears them limb from limb. Although there were no survivors to recount the details of the event, the bloody boats littered with torn limbs and gallons of blood, combined with this photo, told the story clearly enough. Unlike US President Barack Obama, it appears that the owl did not particularly enjoy Martha's Vineyard, although like President Obama food was on the owl's agenda during the stopover there.

A relaxing start to the academic year was about to become a bloodbath

The owl was next spotted further west in Pittsburgh, where dozens of colleges and universities had recently begun the new academic year. An attendee at a barbecue party for graduate students at Carnegie Mellon University and/or the University of Pittsburgh was taking a photo of friends at the barbecue, and only later realized that he had photographed the owl assessing the scene for prey. "It was just a really chill get-together," the student recounted. "With the year starting up again, and some of us not being around all summer, we were just catching up, drinking some beers and grilling some food. I didn't expect a giant owl to eat all my friends. I guess it goes without saying that this is the worst start to a new school year ever."

If only they had watched Jaws instead of Julie & Julia

Continuing to carve a swathe of destruction westward, the owl was next spotted doing a flyby of a rooftop barbecue party (with other food that wasn't barbecued as well) in Cleveland, Ohio. After devouring between two and fourteen attendees, the owl began flinging furniture off the twelve-story apartment building, killing and injuring an additional seven to 49 people. A survivor described the scene: "Stephanie had been talking about putting on some kind of fancy girls' day out barbecue for a while. Ever since she decided to become a foodie, she was going on about how she wanted to do a big fancy spread, and of course she couldn't just fire up a barbecue like normal people. She spent weeks trawling farmers' markets and fancy grocery stores looking for just the right ingredients for her piece de resistance menu. Finding the right freaking wine was a massive production. By the time the event finally rolled around, I was ready to drink straight-up Everclear -- the 190 proof stuff that isn't even legal in Ohio -- that's how tired I was of hearing how she slaved to find just the right whatevers for the salad. The food wasn't even that good. But nobody wanted to tell her, because she was going on about how she slaved over this stupid thing. It looks like now I'll never have the chance to tell her. I'm just glad she was dead before that owl tossed the food off the roof, because that would have just added insult to injury."

Their first taste of American culture would be their last meal

The owl was later spotted in Chicago, at a Labor Day barbecue party hosted by an organization sponsoring international students who were spending the school year at American high schools. Tragically, between seven and 215 students and organization staff members were killed at the barbecue. "We thought a barbecue would be a fun way to introduce the kids to an American holiday tradition, while allowing them to meet fellow study abroad students," said an administrator who asked to remain anonymous. "Obviously, if we had any clue that a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl was going to attack the party, we never would have held it. I feel really awful about the whole thing. I think, for me, the worst thing is they first seemed to think the owl was part of the party, like a really realistic mascot or robot or something. They didn't know the thing was dangerous."

The City of Lights became the City of Darkness

As dawn broke over Paris, the capital of France, renowned for its culture, architecture, and romance, the city was greeted by a strange sight: a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl (harfang de neige in French) perched atop the Eiffel Tower.

A bad omen...

Hundreds of millions of native Parisians and tourists from across the globe reported the gigantic creature surveying his surroundings with a menacing air. One French witness described the scene as 'like something out of an expensive yet worthless American Hollywood movie', a sentiment repeated by 341,109 other French people witnessing the sight.

After looking menacingly at the city, the owl then took off, circled the Eiffel Tower several times, and then fatally compromised the structure with his talons. As the tower collapsed, he battered it with his wings, sending it crashing into the Seine River and killing between 684 and 29,762 people.

Suddenly the view from the top doesn't look as good...

The skyline of Paris was about to change dramatically.

After smashing the Eiffel Tower, the owl proceeded to another famous Parisian landmark: the Arc de Triomphe, commissioned in 1806 by Napoleon Bonaparte to commemorate his victory at the Battle of Austerlitz. Perching on top of the Arc, the snowy owl crushed several dozen or hundreds of tourists beneath his talons, and flung the bodies onto the ground of the Place Charles de Gaulle below.

Napoleon might soil his pants if he could see this.

After smashing many of the sculptures on the arc, the owl proceeded to circle the monument, then flew above the heavy morning rush hour traffic, and seized between one and eight dozen cars and busses and flung them against the Arc de Triomphe. As the vehicles' petrol caught fire, causing numerous exlposions, the marble of the monument was stained by soot and flame. Apparently unafraid of the inferno, the owl returned to the monument to smash it to bits in a series of strafing flybys with his talons.

Ten minutes later, this scene would be engulfed in flames.

The owl then flew down a charming street lined with brick houses, where an older Frenchman in a beret was selling strings of garlic on his bicycle. The owl apparently killed the man and 18 customers, and took the garlic.

About to try some French Cuisine

The owl proceeded to enter a nearby bakery, where a French patissier had just prepared a large number of gateaux, as well as dozens of loaves of fresh bread, and was about to enjoy some wine. A witness reported that the jovial baker offered the owl some wine and bread. What happened afterwards was not recorded, but it is a safe bet that carnage ensued.

Bon appetit, or Au Revoir?

Shortly afterwards, the owl was spotted in front of Notre Dame cathedral, where a mime was entertaining a large crowd of both tourists and native Parisians. The owl silently crept up behind the mime, who did not interrupt his act when threatened. Unfortunately, his dedication to artistic integrity cost him his life, as the owl bit his head off before attacking the crowd.

Is he trying to tell us it's a good time to die?

A student who witnessed the scene reported, "The harfang [snowy owl] came up behind the mime when he was, well, I don't know what the mime was doing. It wasn't very good, but you know how tourists are, they eat this nonsense up like they eat croissants. Me, I just like to yell at the mime and the tourists. They're all idiots, you know. Oh, but the harfang... it came up behind the mime and tore off his head but didn't eat it, he spat it onto these tourists who were videotaping the whole thing. It's too bad the harfang then smashed them and their video camera, because that video would have been something to see. It smashed a lot of other people too. Some people were screaming and trying to run away, but I thought, I'll offer it some wine to see if it would drink. You know, I had this idea that this scenario would be funnier if the harfang was drunk. So I offered it my bottle, but instead of drinking it, it just grabbed it and smashed it into the face of some British tourist. I almost pissed myself I started laughing so hard. By the way, have you ever drank French wine? It's much better than the piss you Americans make in Colorado or wherever.' None of the rest of the eyewitness's drunken ramblings were worth reporting.

The next stop on the owl's tour of destruction was the world-famous Louvre museum, one of the greatest repositories of art on the planet. The owl smashed the glass pyramid designed by the architect I.M. Pei, then proceeded inside the massive building to wreak further havoc.

And a cloud of doom descended from the sky...

They came to see the Mona Lisa, but soon nobody would be smiling.

A tourist captured a scene in front of one of the most famous paintings in the world, Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa. As hundreds of visitors were snapping pictures of the masterwork, the owl appeared in front of the crowd, where he was heard to utter a menacing noise that was described as sounding like 'Rrrrrrrrrrrrr' before he unleashed his rage on the crowd.

Careful photographic analysis reveals that this owl appears to be the very same grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl involved in attacks across the United States. World leaders have been advised to be prepared for the possibility of an international campaign of destruction unleashed by the owl. So far, it is believed that the owl is impervious to bullets, but this hypothesis was not tested in the recent attack on Paris, as no armed resistance was evidently offered.

After this attack, French speaking people have begun to refer to the owl as l'harfang d'enfer: the Hellish Owl.

A day to declare independence...from living!

As the sun rose on Saturday, the 4th of July, billions of Americans looked forward to holiday festivities, including barbecues, parades, fireworks and fun. Little did they know that fate intended to add a new element into the festivities: carnage. A grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl embarked upon a coast-to-coast tour of dread, sparing neither man, woman nor child wherever he stopped.

The owl was first spotted flying up and down the main street of the small Ohio city of Xenia, made famous through its depiction in the blockbuster feature film Gummo, which was described by one person as a 'masterpiece', although most people consider it 'a bunch of crap' that 'doesn't really depict Xenia at all, more of some artsy-fartsy filmmaker's twisted idea of small town America'. Whatever one's opinion on the film Gummo, however, there was no denying that the grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl rained destruction upon the town to a degree not seen since the tornado of 1974.

Little did he know that the parade was about to turn into a funeral procession

By the time the owl had finished, between 35 and 20,481 people were killed in Xenia. Additionally, the owl smashed between 10 and 268 schools, 181 and 9,495 businesses, and left between 10,784 and 58,000 people homeless in the attack.

The owl then flew northwest to the village of Barrington, Illinois, where their annual 4th of July parade was in full swing.

The owl began the attack by a series of flybys over the children's bicycle entry. Possibly attracted by the bright colors, fluttering streamers and bizarre headgear worn by the children, the owl buzzed the crowd of thousands of children, ripping the hats, and in some cases the heads, off the attendees.

They were about to pray that their bikes were 10-speeders...

After leaving dozens or hundreds of children and their parents dead or fleeing in terror, the owl proceeded to fly along the parade route. It perched in a tree near the historic Catlow theatre for a few moments, before decimating the parade and the assembled crowd.

Unfortunately, their aerobics skills could not save them from a predator capable of flight

A survivor recounted, 'I was just enjoying the parade. It was a nice day, you know. I saw the big polar owl in the tree, but I thought somehow it must be part of the parade. But once it looked at me, and listen, that owl had evil eyes. That is the only way I can describe it -- evil. I got up and moved away, because I was starting to have a bad feeling. It just sat in the tree for a while, till the Jazzercize people came along, with their music blasting. And then the owl looked like he meant business. I don't know if it was because of the music - believe me, the music was really bad and annoying -- or if was because they somehow reminded him of lemmings or mice or whatever these owls eat, or maybe just his own evil nature. But there can be no doubt that at that moment the owl went crazy. I realized he was going to make a move and got a little bit away from the owl before everything went to hell, but it was a narrow escape. I know a lot of people were not lucky.

'The Barrington motto said this is "a great place to live, work and play". I don't think anybody is saying that any more. It is a horrible place to die a screaming, bloody death while being torn apart by a giant polar owl.'

Between 87 and 14,864 people were killed in the attack on Barrington.

Archaeologist Dr. Daniel Freemont, who recently shocked the academic community with his discovery of 300-year-old photographs depicting a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl in colonial America, believes that there may be a link between the owl and the history of the places that have been attacked. 'Not many people know that Xenia was built right next to the center of civilized Native American activity in the Ohio Territory. We're talking major Shawnee territory. Tecumseh was born like two miles from Xenia. Barrington was also originally settled by Native Americans. Now, I'm not saying that Native Americans are responsible for the owl attacking people. I believe this owl has been attacking people long before there were Europeans in North America. But I think that the Native American community might have some useful knowledge about the owl. It seems like our everyday methods of dealing with this threat have been useless. We need to start thinking outside the box if we don't want to see a death toll in the billions.'

The owl was last spotted in New Jersey, flying due east. Witnesses reported the silhouette of a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl illuminated by fireworks. It is believed that the owl may have also seized some fireworks to employ in attacking people, but this speculation remains unconfirmed in the absence of survivors; it may be weeks until the full extent of the owl's carnage is known.

A shadow of death falling across the blazing festivities

A Day of Rememberance became a day nobody would ever forget.

On 25 May 2009, citizens across the United States of America celebrated Memorial Day. For some, it was a day to remember the men and women who gave their lives in the service of their country. For others, it was a day to relax on the beach, or enjoy barbecues, or sit in traffic as they went to or from holiday destinations. Whatever their thoughts and intentions, however, nobody expected a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl to stage a coast-to-coast campaign of mayhem and devastation on the holiday, which for many marks the unofficial start of Summer.

A Memorial Day dawn unlike any other in Washington DC

As Reveille sounded over Arlington National Cemetery, the silhouette of an enormous bird of prey appeared against the rising sun. As the giant owl buzzed the gate of Arlington Cemetery, sentinels fired at it, but their bullets proved ineffective. A jogger who observed the confrontation reported, 'Our guys lobbed enough lead at that thing to bring it down several times over, but it was like the bullets had no effect on it.' The owl did not attack the cemetery or anybody in the vacinity, however; it is unknown whether being fired at was a deterrent, or if the owl simply had other plans. Authorities reported no casualties.

The jogger said, 'I wouldn't be surprised if that owl didn't come back, though. I saw its eyes before it flew away, and I'll tell you what I saw there. Hatred. Pure unadulterated hatred. And evil.'

The grizzly-bear-sized owl was then observed flying east along the Potomac River, in the direction of the Chesapeake Bay.

Heavy holiday traffic is about to become the least of anyone's problems

As millions of vehicles streamed across the William Preston Lane, Jr. Memorial Bridge (informally known as the Bay Bridge) near Annapolis, Maryland, the grizzly-bear-sized owl was spotted perching on the westbound span, observing the cars as they rolled towards the popular beach resorts on Maryland's eastern shore and Delaware. Eyewitnesses boating on the Chesapeake Bay reported seeing the owl swoop down and seize cars, shaking the vacationers out of the vehicles as though they were salt granules in a salt shaker. He apparently then devoured some people in mid-air, and then went back to pick remaining survivors off the bridge.

Truck, or can of sardines?

Local news stations scrambled to get footage of the grizzly-bear-sized owl in action. One intrepid team captured a scene of the owl ripping the top off a Tyson foods delivery truck, which was packed with tons of poultry products intended for local supermarkets. Unphased at the thought of eating other birds, the owl devoured the entire contents of the truck, before flinging the empty shell of the truck at the news chopper.

A car is about to be taken on a completely unexpected spin

After destroying approximately six million vehicles and causing traffic delays that lasted well into Wednesday 27 May, the owl flew west along Interstate 80. As countless vacationers sat in bumper-to-bumper traffic along Interstate 80 heading from the Bonneville Salt Flats towards the Wasatch Mountains, the owl landed and proceeded to stomp on cars, fling them around, and devour the occupants. After puncturing the gas tanks of several cars which were flung into forests next to the road, the owl started a wildfire that continues to blaze out of control, and which has consumed approximately 2 billion acres of forest in Utah, Wyoming, and Kentucky. Amidst billowing smoke and flames that eyewitnesses described as 'hellish', the owl continued west along Interstate 80.

An angel of death emerges from the mist

As Memorial Day dawned bright and foggy over San Francisco, tens of millions of people went about their holiday plans. The Golden Gate Bridge was already jammed with travellers getting an early start on their day. In a devastating early morning attack, however, the grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl appeared through the mist and, an a scene all to familiar, began destroying vehicles and devouring their inhabitants, sometimes spitting them out into the San Francisco Bay.

Memorial Day smorgasbord

A member of the Golden Gate Bridge's board of directors said, "What's especially sad is that we recently approved funding to build a suicide barrier along the bridge. We wanted to save all those lives. Now what do we do? Put surface-to-air missiles on the towers? Like that is going to go over well with the voters here."

Berkeley resident 'John Doh' said, 'I can't believe nobody is concerned about the environmental implications of this attack. Today is Memorial Day -- the first day of Summer, culturally speaking. What the [expletive] is a snowy owl doing all the way down in San Francisco on Memorial Day? Shouldn't they be in the Arctic?'

A vacationing couple dressed in homespun hemp clothing agreed with Mr. Doh. The woman, a vaguely masculine looking man with heavy fuzzy-bear-caterpillar eyebrows and a sketchbook containing art that resembled the work of a spastic individual who had recently lost their dominant hand, said, 'I for one am glad to see that nature is fighting the industrial-capitalist complex that is posisoning the earth. I've always believed that nature can bend itself to make a political point, and this will show those [expletives] who say my pre-post-apocalyptic comic is crap.' The man, a shaggy-haired, unshaven individual, said, 'This proves that human civilization is unsustainable. Do you really think we'd have snowy owls coming to San Francisco if civilization wasn't actively killing and raping our planet? How stupid do you have to be to realize this is a sign from the land for us to rise up and smash the capitalist authorities?'

The man was interrupted when the grizzly-bear sized owl proceded to fly overhead and drop a Prius on top of him and his companion. Holiding the vehicle in its talons, the owl continued to smash the Prius on the two people until they were nothing but a vague reddish smear on the pavement.

It should have been the first day of the rest of their lives...

...but it turned out to be the last.

As millions of colleges and universities across the United States prepared for their springtime commencement ceremonies, the grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl that has been terrorizing the country was preparing for a feast of unparalleled magnitude. The owl seemed to know that tens of millions of graduate students were preparing to take their degrees around the middle of May, and as if guided by some hellish internal radar, he preyed upon scores of students.

One of the owl's first stops was the University of California, Berkeley. Family and friends of new graduates snapped several photos of the owl about to strike. He flew to various graduation ceremonies, where he quickly devoured over 92% of attendees. He also was observed to eat several faculty members.

Their big day is about to take a deadly turn

They didn't realize he wasn't just there for the photo op

One unidentified survivor who observed the owl as he devoured the bioengineering department said, "First I thought this couldn't be real. I thought it was either someone's experiment, or maybe just somebody in a big owl suit. But when it started to eat people then I realized it was actually a giant man-eating owl. It was the first time I saw anything like it."

A Berkeley resident, who refused to give his name, stated, "This is definitely the work of Dick Cheney. He probably engineered this thing to torture innocent civilians. I wouldn't be surprised if they don't have a whole fleet of these things somewhere in New Mexico."

A quick flyby before raining doom from above

Eyewitnesses reported mass chaos as the owl began his attack. One anonynous commentator said, "It is disheartening that these folks are supposed to be some of the top engineering students in the country, and nobody could throw together a bomb, or hell, even a sling shot to get this overgrown bag of feathers."

That's not confetti, it is blood.

The owl attacked approximately 780,000 other colleges and universities on the west coast, before flying east to Colorado. Witnesses reported sightings of the grizzly-bear-sized owl appearing over the Rocky Mountains before he flew to the University of Colorado at Boulder. "It was a strangely majestic sight," reported one survivor, "before the owl went straight for the Geology grads and started ripping them apart."

The owl proceeded to attack several hundred thousand more graduation ceremonies. Friends of a student at Ohio State University captured the following image of the owl's attack there.

Maybe they should have been trying to spell 'S.O.S.'

One survivor of the attack took the following photo of the owl about to devour members of the graduation procession en masse.

'It was like a diabolical buffet line'

Tragically, the owl's attacks, which killed between 3,186 and 237 million people nationwide, have decimated the graduate student population in the United States. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said, "This probably means trouble for most key economic sectors in the future, because we've lost a lot of potentially productive researchers and workers. This also probably won't help the ratio of US to international grad students in our schools."

Not everyone was so pessimistic, however. Surviving student C. Sleigh said, "This probably will make it easy for me to win some of those competitive fellowships I keep losing out on. With only, what, a couple dozen grad students left, I'm pretty sure they'll have to fund me now." Unidentified individuals involved with one program Mr. Sleigh had previously applied to responded, "We consider it unlikely that we'll ever fund people who are such cowards that they hid under piles of their fellow students' corpses in order to avoid being killed by a big owl."

Lover's Lane: The Couples, the Cars...the Carnage

An alarming new development has taken place in the saga of destruction caused by a grizzly-bear-sized snowy owl.

Previously, all recorded attacks had been observed to take place on large gatherings of people, such as festivals, celebrations, or crowded areas. However, following the attacks on 5 May 2009 that left between 27 and 5,197 people dead, new evidence has come to light that the owl has begun attacking couples in or near cars on lovers' lanes across the United States.

Too wrapped up in each other to notice looming death...

The owl's first victims on what has been described as an attack on Lovers' Lanes across the nation were a Dr. B. Massengil of Columbus, Ohio, and Ms. J. Marshall, described by acquaintances as Dr. Massengil's 'trophy girlfriend'. The owl evidently tore the couple limb from limb, before crumpling up Dr. Massengil's new car 'like a tin can', according to witnesses.

The majesty and the hell of nature...

The owl was next sighted at Yosemite National Park, California. A photographer had paused to get a photograph of a romantic couple that had recently exited their car to admire the beautiful scenery, when he captured the moment that the grizzly-bear-sized raptor appeared from amidst the trees. The owl seized the couple in his talons and devoured them on the spot, before flinging their car into the valley below, where the gas tank exploded and started a wildfire that continues to rage out of control.

He paid to go all the way, but fate threw them a detour.

The owl then left the Yosemite National Park and flew to the Portland, Oregon, area, where he killed one Mr. F. Pooner, a student at Portland Community College, and one Ms. S. Pie, an actress and prostitute. The mangled, bloody corpses of Mr. Pooner and Ms. Pie were found inside the car, which, paradoxically, was not damaged in the attack, initially leading authorities to believe that the owl could not have been responsible. Photographic evidence, however, conclusively demonstrates that the owl was, in fact, the culprit.

A marriage about to end before it really started

A Mr. S. C. Colburt and his new bride were among the last known victims. Fresh from a beachside wedding in southern California, in which Mr. Colburt was reputed to have worn a shirt that was not tucked into his trousers, the newlyweds stopped along Interstate 5 en route to Mexico to revel in the romance of the moment. Eyewitnesses reported that they never saw the grizzly-bear-sized owl land next to their car. Evidently the owl was able to bite off both their heads in one bite due to the proximity of their faces.

In total, between ten and 2,871 people have been killed in the recent attacks on couples in cars. Authorities across the nation are urging couples planning to visit lovers' lanes to exercise due caution and be alert for the possibility of an attack from the deadly predator.