Several weeks ago, a young soccer fan stumbled upon a solid gold egg wrapped in scarves in the refrigerated section of an Acme grocery store. With a little bit of love from the Philadelphia Zoo, the egg grew five times its original size and on Monday hatched into a six-foot-tall blue snake that somehow has arms, legs, and a golden mohawk.
The Philadelphia Union, the city's Major League Soccer team, on Monday unveiled its first-ever mascot: Phang, a reptilian creature that's a reference to the team's crest, which features a rattlesnake that itself pays homage to the "Join, or Die" political cartoon attributed to Benjamin Franklin.