originally posted on Metroblogging Chicago

The Mighty Athletes

My roommate is a fan of bars in general, but especially of bars with activities -- karaoke, goldfish racing, pub quizzes -- if you can win a t-shirt with a bar logo on it, he's there. So Friday afternoon when he called and asked, "Do you and Erica want to come to turtle racing tonight?" I was not very surprised, even though I had no idea what turtle racing might be. Would we be squirting turtles with squirt guns? Would that make a turtle move?

Turns out the first rule of Turtle Racing at Big Joe's 2 and 6 Pub (1818 W Foster) is "don't touch the turtles". (They don't mention this, but it's not just for the turtles' sake.) And there are no squirtguns. Buying drinks gets you tickets, a randomly-drawn ticket makes you an honorary Turtle Jockey for a race, the turtles run out from the middle of a table towards the edges, and a winning turtle wins you a t-shirt. The loseriest turtle gets its jockey a free drink.

It was DumbFun enough to distract us from the Bulls' HorribleStupid loss to the Wizards, so there you go.