giant infestation of giant rats in Brighton BeachSomething has gone very, very wrong in your life if you have to ask yourself, "Would I rather continue killing these cat-size rats, or find out whether a rat king is an honest-to-God thing?" That thing that went wrong was moving to Brighton Beach.

A year ago the neighborhood had a pretty bad rat problem, caused by a massive rat's nest which the city destroyed with traps and poison. Unfortunately, if there's one thing giant rats love more than training turtles in the fine art of kung fu, it's building gigantic nests in Brighton Beach, and another enormous one was recently disturbed by a construction project on the 8th St. Bridge. One resident counted 30 rats roaming his block one night last week, and another who set out poisoned traps has already caught 15 of the suckers, some of which were 18 inches long!

So far the only action the city has taken towards the problem is recognizing that it exists. It takes a lot to make us say this, but suddenly, living in Bushwick doesn't seem like such a raw deal.