PHILADELPHIA — Local man Nathan Burke was traumatized by an onslaught of unattractive people in Fairmount Park after he took acid on a picnic blanket with the intent of enjoying a pleasant afternoon, sources report.
“It was perfect. A Brian Eno playlist. A cooler full of ice cream sandwiches. Some nice loose fitting clothes. But nobody ever warns you about avoiding ugly people while you are tripping, and this city is full of trolls,” said a visibly shaken Burke. “This family was having a picnic, eating rotisserie chicken on all fours without their hands. I turned around and these two guys playing frisbee smiled and their chins touched their eyeballs. A sausage and egg Sizzli from Wawa screamed in Portuguese while ducks pecked at it. There was a lady in thick pancake makeup applying eyeshadow with a trowel. Dark swirling holes for eyes. She tried to sell me a Joel Embiid jersey for a butterfly kiss on the cheek. It was too much man. I got the FUCK out of there.”
Burke’s friend and supplier of said acid, Shawn Aparo, offered some perspective of the situation.
“Look, Nathan was in a bad place after his break-up and wanted a hundred years of therapy in a day to move on. But this wasn’t his first rodeo. I figured he would be smart enough to control his environment, but he was the dumbass who wanted to play dice in Fairmount Park,” reported Aparo. “Even if you’re sober, that place is just rowing teams of Buscemi eyes and necklaces of skin tags . Some things you just don’t do. And being on drugs especially is most of those things.”
Among the subjects of Thompson’s hallucinogenic horror was Adrian Danon, 75, a local park regular known for his eyepatch.
“Oh yeah, the young fella screamed when he saw me. Thought I was a pirate of some sort I suppose,” Danon recounted. “I’m used to it at this point. Kids these days are too sensitive. Back in my day, we didn’t have drugs to blame when we saw an ugly face. We just married it. We loved it. Made a life with it. That’s the Philadelphia way. You know, you get past the arms and legs covered in scabs, the yellow teeth, and hope to God that face won’t kill nobody.”
As of press time, Burke is recovering and swears to stay away from Kensington for the rest of his natural life.