I don’t typically swear, but people talk about a shit-ton. Well, what about 4 tons? I am posting this because it was a hell of a moment and memory in my life. This was after a massively freaky bomb scare. God these memories. People don’t get the hotel business. Anyhoo… I had to help clean up 4 tons of manure that was dumped in front of the Wilshire Grand Hotel in Los Angeles, in 2000, because a PETA activist, dressed in a pig costume, drove a dump truck up to the hotel, and dumped it all at our doorstep because we were the hotel for the Democratic National Convention, and Al Gore was with us. He did not see the poop. But, this article is getting way harder to find, and if I lose this image of the guy in the pig costume, one of my favorite “We’ll all laugh about this later” memory would be lost to the wind and digital seas. At the time, I was about 24. I was so frustrated that PETA’s protest was basically just making me, and a bunch of hard working housekeepers, janitors, and the like to clean up stinking poopy. Not a good way to get your messaging to resonate. Idiots.
So, here we go… from the AP!
Live story, 20 years later, at this link.
I was able to find the article because of this guy who likes pig related art activism. lol
LOS ANGELES (AP) – An activist dressed in a pink pig costume dumped four tons of animal manure from a truck Saturday in front of a hotel housing guests attending the Democratic National Convention.
Elsewhere, anti-abortion activists and immigrant rights advocates organized small protests, the first in a week of demonstrations expected to draw thousands during the convention that starts Monday.
At the Wilshire Grand Hotel, about 10 people from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals stood on the sidewalk as the activist dumped the manure in the hotel driveway. Some wore the same full-body pig costumes and carried placards that read, “Meat is murder.”
Police impounded the truck and arrested the driver, Sean McKinney Diener, 20, of Layton, Utah. He was booked for illegal dumping, a misdemeanor.
City workers and hotel employees cleaned up the 5-foot by 10-foot spill with shovels and trashcans.
In February, the group performed a similar stunt outside a restaurant where Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush had just eaten breakfast.
