According to a joint statement issued by the USDA Forest Service and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, a new virus called Sudden Oak Death is on the rise in the human community. The disease, originating from Western Oak trees, has been traced to the University of California, Berkeley, where a group of tree-sitters on the campus are believed to have first contracted and passed the disease to humans.
UCPD officer Thomas Laferty was at the scene when the plague claimed its first victim. “Officer [Gerald] Kincaid and I were just about ready to give up on removing Fresh from his tree. We had tried every tactic in the book, from leaning leisurely against the barricade to smoking while talking about our wives. All of a sudden, we looked up from a particularly heated game of hopscotch to find that Fresh had dropped out of the tree like an overripe coconut. EMTs came, and the next thing you know, the doctors are calling it Sudden Oak Death.”
The rapidly spreading disease is characterized by boils on the arms and inner thighs, inflammation of lymph nodes, and sudden death. At-risk groups include lumberjacks, energetic young children, and members of Greenpeace, which led some members of the environmental movement to suggest that SOD is a government-engineered weapon designed to eliminate the environmental movement; this allegation, in turn, led others to suggest that the environmental movement shut the fuck up. The president of Greenpeace was unavailable for comment, as he is currently seeking treatment for a scorching case of Dutch Elm Disease.
