Bears. n.

1. Big hairy chunks of snarl. Big teeth, powerful body, all-consuming love of salmon.
2. Husky, large, manly gay men, with a lot of body hair.
3. Beverages consumed by the illiterate.

This article is about evading #1.

Why might I want to evade a bear?

Bears are large animals, with correspondingly large teeth and a propensity for snarling at bees. While many have a zen-like demeanor (cf Yogi Bear), every year a handful of people in the United States alone are killed by these beautiful animals. Typical reasons for attracting the ire of most species of bear include the following:

1. You have wandered into their territory.
2. You are a salmon.
3. You are the Pope, and they are disgusted by what you are doing in their woods.
4. You have disrupted their Catholic ceremonies.

The consequences of failure to evade bears

Should the above apply to you, and should you subsequently come into contact with an irate bear, you have two options:

1. Evade bear.
2. Do not evade bear.

While ultimately this choice is yours alone, it is important to understand the consequences of #2. Depending on the variety of bear, these may include:

• brown, black, polar bears: mauling, screaming, involuntary defecation, hairy overhugging, force-feeding of salmon.
• others: caring, warning of the dangers of forest fires, bouncing here and there and everywhere, miming terrifyingly to cassette tapes lodged deep within their unsettling cyborg bellies.

It is hard to overstate the dangers of these outcomes.

Evading bears

To properly evade a bear, you must understand the following principles:

1. Bears are cowardly.
2. Bears enjoy the taste of salmon.
3. Bears are easily confused.

All bear evasion techniques use these fundamental axioms as their basis.

The “bait and switch” technique

1. Keep a decoy salmon on your person at all times.
2. When approached by irate bear, wave decoy salmon at bear until you are sure it is aware of the fish’s presence.
3. Throw salmon as far as you can, in the opposite direction to the one you wish to run to.
4. Run away.

Important: do not use boomerang salmon.

The “existential” technique

1. Point at bear.
2. Shout “BEAR!”
3. While bear is distracted looking down at itself, run away.

The “I am a tree” technique

1. Wear brown trousers and a green sweater.
2. Stand still. Optionally, ooze maple syrup.
3. Gently sway in the breeze.

Important: this technique is not to be attempted if you have a beehive hairdo. The bear will try and climb you and scoop out your brain-honey. This is the opposite of evading a bear.

Practicing bear evasion

They say that practice makes perfect. Largely, this is a lie perpetuated by the practicing industry. Nonetheless, now you are aware of the main techniques involved in evading bears, it is important to ensure you can follow the instructions to an adequate standard. You wouldn’t want to be caught off-guard in the middle of a forest! Not with your Papal duties to attend to.

Obviously, it would be unwise to practice with an actual bear. Sticky situations might arise. Therefore we recommend the following:

1. Find a figure of authority, like a doctor, teacher, police officer, military officer or politician.
2. Pretend they are a bear.

Conclusion: bears

We hope this short guide has been a useful introduction to bear evasion. You may be interested to read our other titles in this series:

• Bringing down City Hall
• Encouraging your cat to take a proactive interest
• Palm oil: nature’s palm oil

This entry was posted on Monday, May 31st, 2010 at 12:25 am and is filed under Bears. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.