Another reason not to text while walking: 300-pound bear roaming streets of LA

[Remix above by @mr_hopkinson; view original at KTLA website. They prohibit embedding. Lame.]

So, this happened in Los Angeles this morning. KTLA choppers filmed a huge black bear on the streets of La Crescenta, and the hilarious (because he didn't die) reaction of a man who stumbled upon the scene while texting and walking.

The bear was pretty mellow, and was eventually tranquilized and removed from the area.

Authorities believe this may be the same bear that broke into a garage last month and pried open a refrigerator to snack on some frozen meatballs.

In fact, when local news reported on the bear's previous wanderings through that same neighborhood, he was known as the "Meatball-Eating Black Bear." A snip from KTLA's earlier news coverage:

Resident Joey Ball heard noises around 3 a.m. and got up to investigate. "He had steam coming out of his nose, and he had food on his face," Ball said. "It was crazy!"
The bear had entered the garage through an outside door that had been left open. "He had the refrigerator door open," Ball said. "... He had all these drawers laying around and there was food everywhere."
Ball said the hungry bear tore through the freezer, eating tuna and Costco meatballs.

He will now be returned to the Angeles National Forest, where he can roam in peace. No more Costco meatballs.

(via TV Spy, thanks, Miles O'Brien; photo: KTLA)

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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satn

brb shtng pnts
David Kopelman

here kitty, kitty….
joeposts

There’s gotta be an app for that.
http://twitter.com/HumanPrototype0 Brian

When you see it, you’ll shit bricks.
tosh79

haha, five seconds later on his twitter account… WTF! BEAR!
- charming.quark
  
  The bear has his own twitter account…
  https://twitter.com/#!/TheGlendaleBear
Chuck

Now I’m wondering about all those times I’ve absent-mindedly stuck a hand out to let a passing dog sniff it.
Brainspore

GO BRUINS!

No, seriously. Shoo!
Svenski

Not exactly the streets of L.A. This was in La Crescenta, north of L.A. – L.A. County, yes, L.A., no.
- http://www.jjsaul.com Jim Saul
  
  You’re the bear, aren’t you?
  - http://www.disoriented.net/ angusm
    
    Pending the resolution of his lawsuit against the La Crescenta police department for assault, wrongful arrest and illegal detention, Svenski has been advised by his lawyer to neither confirm nor deny that he is the bear in question. He can, however, confirm that additional lawsuits may be filed with respect to defamation, specifically groundless allegations of meatball theft made by local residents and news organizations.
    - Svenski
      
      Okay, now in full pedant mode. There is no La Crescenta PD, it’s Glendale PD with a few sweeps by the L.A. County Sheriff’s (aka The Briggs Piggs).
      - Guest
        
        Did somebody eat your porridge? ;)
      - GlenBlank
        
        Heh. I’m just glad you beat me to it.
        
        ‘La Crescenta’ is a fake-Spanish name made up by a doctor from Indiana, who thought it was Spanish for “the crescent” – referring to three local crescent-shaped valleys.
        
        It’s not a city itself – the name refers to an area that’s part of unincorporated Montrose and part of the northern tip of Glendale.
        
        Montrose isn’t LA, and it doesn’t border LA – but you *can* see LA from there on a clear day. :-)
        
        (Curiosity: “Briggs Piggs”? Is that a reference to Briggs Terrace?)
      - zuben
        
        peda bear?
http://www.disoriented.net/ angusm

Could we get about a dozen of those here in NYC? We have a serious problem with “texting zombies”, and I’m thinking that a few black bears might be just what we need.
smoovjay

This is pretty much exactly the same thing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qO2oCDSH-SU
- ComradeQuestions
  
  I’m sick of these constant bear attacks. It’s like a frickin’ country bear jambaroo around here!
http://twitter.com/BroCookie Ryan

This video has been removed by the user. Sorry about that :/

Does anyone have a re-upload?
http://twitter.com/Craig_Metcalfe_ Craig Metcalfe

KTLA took the video off Youtube, here’s a link to it on their site http://www.ktla.com/videogallery/69305258/News/VIDEO-Texting-Man-Comes-Face-To-Face-With-Bear
http://twitter.com/JewelDole Julie Dole

What that guy needed was a guard cat!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57VbE0J9niw
Quiche de Resistance

I have had it with these melon farming bears on this melon farming sidewalk!
- Svenski
  
  Well, said the farmer’s daughter…
Svenski

That bear made it pretty far from the foothills and to have crossed under the 210 before being darted is impressive.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Amorette-Allison/1163340223 Amorette Allison

I live in Montana, where we do worry about bears when we are in some places, but seeing one in a California town. . .
- Brainspore
  
  Actually a lot of places in California have bears… we ARE home to Yosemite National Park, after all. Major cities and their suburbs are another matter though.
  - GlenBlank
    
    Heck, the LA area used to have grizzly bears, too, before they were hunted to extinction in the late 19th century.
    
    (Hey, for that matter, the LA area used to have dire wolves and mammoths and giant ground sloths. Most of those disappeared right around the same time that the first evidence of local human habitation turns up.)
    - Brainspore
      
      California even had a brief stint of (largely symbolic) independence as “The Bear Flag Republic” for a couple of weeks in 1846. In fact the state flag is pretty much the only lasting legacy of that little revolt.
      - Antinous / Moderator
        
        What about this?
      - Brainspore
        
        @Antinous_Moderator:disqus : I’m not sure it’s fair to blame that one on a few dozen 19th-century rednecks.
AquaDad

300 pounds. Man! We are too weight conscious here in Socal. It’s Springtime. Bear hasn’t eaten since December, right?
Antinous / Moderator

We had a bear downtown a couple of years ago. Honestly, when you’ve already got mountain lions, bears don’t seem that terrifying.
- zuben
  
  Needs more tigers.
Guest

So a guy walks into a bear….
- Felton / Moderator
  
  Sometimes you eat the bar…
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    That’s some serious subtext going on there.
    - Cowicide
      
      300 pounds is unusual, but there’s plenty of 200 pound bears roaming the streets of LA.
  - Guest
    
    That was the other direction I wanted to go with! High 5!
http://twitter.com/sarahfenix sarahfenix

Follow @TheGlendaleBear on Twitter!
vrplumber

He is lucky that the bear wasn’t hungry or feeling threated.

His flight response could have caused the bear to chase him, although repressing the instinct to run from danger in that situation seems almost impossible.

@ Antinous/Moderator

Ok, if i get to wear yummy parsley, I’m definitely sticking around :)
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  If the bear is hungry, you’re supposed to run; failing to do so is like tucking a sprig of parsley behind your ear.
- tomrigid
  
  10 million years don’t lie. Run from the bear, as fast as you can.
  - Cowicide
    
    It was LA, I’m surprised he didn’t rush the bear, jump on top of him and take him for a joyride. A bear-jacking, if you will.
Ed Falk

How is it that nobody has posted this Onion link yet? http://www.theonion.com/video/breaking-news-some-bullshit-happening-somewhere,16928/
Cowicide

Costco meatballs no more

Couldn’t Obama retrofit the drones to air drop the bear some Costco meatballs in the woods?
- Preston Sturges
  
  My crackhead housemate denied eating my frozen Costco meatballs until I came home and found a warm meatball on the kitchen floor.
  - Cowicide
    
    Sounds like a bear of a roommate. [snare drum]
    - Preston Sturges
      
      Cocaine is a hell of a drug.
      - Cowicide
        
        Frozen Costco meatballs are no match for cocaine-addled scoundrels.
Preston Sturges

This makes TheOnions classic bear story “Breaking News: Some Bullshit Happening Somewhere” even more funny, if that’s possible.

http://youtu.be/MxEFQPmMLa4
Sean Nelson

Video was taken down on a copyright claim by the Tribune :(
- Sean Nelson
  
  Wow – I watched the original video on KTLA’s website. They make you watch a new ad every time you replay the video. That’s really obnoxious.