An Old Mystery Re-emerges

Saw this on the way in to work, on the corner of Wells and Wacker. The messed up thing about this note? I saw a prior version earlier this year, in February.

Today’s note traces back to February 3, 2004. And yesterday’s river freezing traces back to February 2, 2004. When I saw this note (again), it felt like I became privy to the secret internal clockwork of the city… which, apparently, runs on a 10 month repeat cycle.

So fast forward to lunch, with Ben treating me to a meal at Pepper Canister – a nearby pub type place on Wells. He had gotten some sort of gift certificate online, and so the two of us headed out for a quick bite.

En route, I realized we were passing 446 North Wells, the very address mentioned in the mystery post-it note. Turns out, it’s a UPS store.

And, being the good blogger that I am, I went in to take a shot of Box 241.

After lunch, as we were walking back up Wells… I spotted YET ANOTHER OF THESE POST-IT NOTES, this time on the corner of Wells and Kinzie. Ben and I were both pretty beside ourselves. It’s one thing to find such a weird note almost a year after the fact. But two in one day?

Adventurers that we were, the two of us decided to roam around a bit to see if we could find any additional notes. We swung down Kinzie over to LaSalle, keeping an eye out for anything square and yellow tacked to the lampposts.

Nothing at this corner, but I did happen to spot a You Are Beautiful sticker on Kinzie and LaSalle.

We walked up to Wacker, swung back over to Wells and I think we went as far south as Washington. No luck on seeing anything else, but I have to admit… I was laughing a lot, and felt as giddy as a schoolkid. Something about going out on a random search reminded me of childhood, and scavenger hunts.

Although we didn’t find any more notes, I had a blast walking around with Ben looking. We may not have solved this mystery, but we at least glimpsed it. I have no idea if this thing is a scam, if it’s the ravings of some mentally deranged person, or if it’s some kind of weird 12 Monkeys thing.

In our conversations, Ben and I both felt that the mystery of the post-its hung with the word beatings. On first glance, you want to think it’s some misspelling, or error. The rest of the note seems coherent and fairly grammatical. But there’s something in that first sentence that just doesn’t sit right. Without the grocery check, the author is going to get beat up?

I want to know who wrote this, and why. If they can afford a PO Box at the UPS store, what’s up with the random post-its?