It’s a running joke in my family that Atlanta is populated by angry tree gods. Perhaps they’re a splinter cell of ents. We’ve never been sure. But every single time that it rains here (and it rains a lot), trees fall down. Big trees. In the roads, onto houses, onto peoples’ cars.

To shamelessly steal a joke from my thesis advisor, the “Decatur difference” is that the trees will kill you.

But today the trees reached a devious new low. Today it didn’t rain (yay!). And yet, when I turned away from Piedmont Park and into the main drag of Atlanta’s small-but-hearty downtown, there was a fallen tree blocking all but one lane of the six-lane road.

This was outside of the W Hotel downtown. There aren’t really any trees adjacent to the road. As best as I can tell, the tree gods imported the  thing just to mess with us. Perhaps it was a drinks promotion from the W Whiskey Park. I have no idea.

The cops hadn’t arrived to direct traffic by the time that I was driving through, which left everyone in a state of confusion. We did make it through, though–pretty much everyone allowed everyone else the right of way. It was a courteous response, all things considered. The ents did not break our spirits.

Hopefully it wasn’t an omen from the tree gods. Because if it was, based on the car discussion topics either my thesis, my graduation, or my possible adoption of a dog are cursed.

If you don’t hear from me again, assume the trees did it, ‘kay?