Hey, what's that? Kudzilla! by MARK PRICE

KUDZILLA

I got this from:


Charlotte Observer
Posted on Tue, Sep. 10, 2002

A mass of kudzu that looks amazingly like Godzilla.

Dale Hillyard is a security guard, so it makes sense that he was first in his neighborhood to see Godzilla in some kudzu ... or rather kudzu that looks like Godzilla.

Decide for yourself: Go to the intersection of Ridge Lane and Rumple Street in the Derita area and look into the trees. Either you'll see Godzilla, or you won't.

Whichever you admit to says a lot about the way your mind works.

"I think it says I pay attention to my surroundings," says Hillyard, 62, who refers to the blob as Kudzilla. "Nobody has told me I'm crazy. Not yet, anyway."

He's taken some photos and showed them to friends, asking if they see something funny.

Luckily, all have, which is believable. It's a tradition in the South to imagine seeing things in our yards and gardens. Mutant potatoes that look like rabbits. Deformed carrots that resemble Barbie dolls. Turnips that could be George Washington crossing the Delaware in a pickup.

County fairs thrive on such stuff.

Granted, no one else in the state has claimed to see a 30-foot-tall Godzilla in kudzu, but Hillyard is from Nevada.

They do things big in Vegas.

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I told Quida when she gets her double wide, she can trim her own topiary out of kudzu.