Five days to the iPhone. If you care. I don’t. I’m perfectly content with my cellphone, which has a ringtone like a bee trying to burp the melody of “Bolero.”
Today in MN history: the boss came to town. You can imagine the man’s chagrin when he got to St. Paul in 1849: 800 souls, the bare rudiments of civilization, mud, humidity, mosquitoes. Sanitation that was a few hundred years away from Roman standards. You can imagine his wife’s reaction when she saw their house: an empty saloon. That smell would never come out. He was 34 years old, and on this day he started his job as the territorial governor. His name was Alexander Ramsey; you might have heard of him. He had a rich political career – mayor of St. Paul, Governor of the State of Minnesota, U.S. Senator. Ramsey County is named after him, of course, as well as Ramsey Park and the city of Ramsey and probably a hundred streets scatttered across the state.
It’s a good thing his name wasn’t Blurfuhrt. No one would have named anything after him.
Perhaps our current names, so airy and kind and friendly, reflect a reaction to 19th century names, most of which have the grace of a marble bust bouncing down stone steps. Thorvald Jehosophat Svengsgvist. Herkimer Zagnut Morgenheimerschmitt. People had beefy names back then. It’s almost as if parents chose the monikers based on how they’d look when chiseled into a monument. Not to say everyone had a chunky handle – walk into any bar, shout HEY JOHN and half the heads would swivel around. But the Men of Destiny had names that fit their ambitions.
Or so it seems now. Names fall out of fashion, then roll back up to the surface a hundred years later. My parents’ generation abounded with names no one uses anymore, perfectly fine names that won’t be used for another 30 years. All the kids who associated the names with aunts and uncles will have to pass from the scene before we get back to the Myrons and Ethels and LaVernes again. Herkimer, however, will never come back. Pity.
It’s the start of our first Picture Theme Week – even though some of you, ahem, have jumped the gun. Fine; we like enthusiasm. The theme is SIGNS. Take a picture, upload it via our simple fool-proof interface, and amuse the multitudes. One request: let’s space this out. If someone just uploaded a photo, don’t knock it out of the box for half an hour. There’s plenty of time for everyone.
Until the next post, a Monday morning topic: summer camp. We packed our kid off to camp this week. I didn’t tell her about snipe hunts. I probably should have warned her, but then again, it’s a rite of passage: if you’re not humiliated by a snipe hunt your first year, you can’t enjoy humiliating the newbies the next time you go to camp. My first time at camp I was sent out in the dark with a stick and a paper bag to catch a snipe. I stood alone in the woods, wind in the trees, owls hooting above, scared out of my shorts. Something darted past in the underbrush: a snipe, no doubt. No doubt. I ran back to the cabin, bag empty, and burst in to find everyone sitting in their bunks, waiting, silent, looking like birds in a Hitchcock movie. “You get a snipe?” the ringleader asked. Absolute silence in the bunkhouse.
“No," I said, "but I think I saw one run past!”
Gales of laughter. Howls of gut-busting hiliarity, derisive but somehow not entirely personal. The ringleader explained the stuation: there weren’t any snipes, pal. It was a wild goose chase. So – snipes were really geese? Because the thing I saw didn’t look like a goose at all – No, no, it’s just a test. It’s a joke. No hard feelings? No hard feelings. But I’m pretty sure everyone snickered themselves to sleep that night. Snipe. Huh. He thought he saw one. Dork.
Maybe I did see one. Maybe everyone does, but who’d believe you?
Amuse us all with your camp stories while new posts are crafted, buffed, and perfected for your internet enjoyment. Welcome to another week @ buzz.mn.
GS Camp
I was sent off to Girl Scout Camp every summer.
(It only lasted 2 weeks or so..) Mostly fond memories.
The best/worst one: It annoyed the heck out of me
that the lake was roped off at a certain point.
Swimming past the rope/float things was VERBOTEN!
One early evening I was in no mood to obey and
slipped through.
Sweet,sweet freedom!
I was halfway across the lake when I heard a
whole lot of yelling from the shore. I thought
"What a bunch of goody two shoes..live a little!"
One voice cut through the din. A bunkmate and fellow
authority scorner yelling "SSNNNAAAAKKKKE!" I turned
my head and saw a lovely textbook example of a
Water Moccasin gliding toward me with great purpose.
That was an interesting moment. "Oh..hell. My
actions have..consequences?"