Symphonic Sneezes

I Googled myself yesterday. I do that every few months to check on all those arrest warrants and bad credit claims that may or may not be against me, but I can pay just $9.95 for the PeopleSearch.com Premium Plan to find out for sure.

Also, as an author, I always enjoy seeing what crazy German, Arabic, and Indian book websites are selling my books, which are all in English. You can pick up a copy of Bullies & Bagels for just under 3,800 rupees. Can you believe it?

There are nine pages of me on Google, and yesterday I scrolled through all of them for fun and a couple of new items caught my eye, besides the possible impending credit and legal actions.

I am now actually quoted on wisefamousquotes.com under the “quotes about spit” category.

Men are far more likely to clean things with spit than women are. ~ Marc Schmatjen

I am definitely the originator of that quote, and while I appreciate them including me in their stable of quoted folks, I do have to take issue with the name of the website and its implied description of the website’s contents. In my opinion, “wisefamousquotes.com” should probably contain only wise quotes by famous people, or famous quotes by wise people, or some combination thereof.

My quote about spit is not wise, and I am not famous. Simply having a quote category named “quotes about spit” calls the entire “wise and famous” premise into serious question, don’t you think?

Still, it was fun to see.

The one that really made my day, though, was a calendar event at The Virginia Discovery Museum. From their website:

The Virginia Discovery Museum is proud to partner with Charlottesville Symphony to offer virtual musical storytimes and instrument demonstrations. Meet a new musician each month as we learn about instruments from the brass, percussion, string, and woodwind families.

On December 4th, 2020, Katy Ambrose, who is the Principal Horn (Brass) for The Charlottesville Symphony, located at The University of Virginia, read (and played) the kids my book, The Very Sneezy Garbage Truck, and apparently introduced them to a DIY instrument called the Hose-O-Phone.

I spit out my coffee when I read that.

What happens when Sneezy the garbage truck picks up his weekly load at a new factory? Meet principal horn Katy Ambrose, from Charlottesville Symphony, and learn all about brass instruments as she brings “The Very Sneezy Garbage Truck” by Marc Schmatjen to life through sound during a virtual musical story time.

I clicked on their link to the DIY project and I could not be more sad that I only just found out about this and I didn’t have the chance to Zoom into the reading back in December. I would have loved to see and hear a professional musician, so skilled in her craft that she is the leader for her instrument in an actual symphony orchestra, make garbage truck sneezing sounds and air horn noises with a makeshift horn constructed from a funnel, a garden hose, and a water bottle cap for a mouthpiece.

I mean, I guess she could have used her actual symphony instrument, but in my mind, she’s reading my goofy book to a bunch of kids and making glorified farts noises with a hose-o-phone.

I emailed the director of programming at the Virginia Discovery Museum, first to tell him or her that they are a genius, and second to request a copy of the recording if it exists.

You can rest assured that when I return to in-person school visits and finally get to read to kids again, the kindergartners and first graders are going to see me walk into their classroom wearing a DIY Hose-O-Phone across my chest like a bandolier!

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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A Ninth Open Letter to the School District

Dear folks in charge of the decision making down at the School District,

I never thought I would need to write you again so soon, but your power to disappoint me apparently knows no bounds. Literally the day after I wrote you about the ridiculousness of “quarantining” Son Number Two, you went ahead and “quarantined” Son Number One.

(I am putting quarantine in quotes here because they are both perfectly healthy with no symptoms of anything, so we haven’t exactly locked them in their rooms, if you catch my drift. School is currently the only place being made off-limits to my school-age children. Crazy, huh?)

Son Number One plays water polo, which is basically wrestling in a pool. The water polo team was not required to get COVID tests last week, because “case rates” (whatever the hell that means) in our county were below a certain, very arbitrary, not chosen by anyone with an IQ higher than room temperature, level. The badminton team, if we had one, would still have been required to test, since badminton is an indoor sport. Same for all other non-contact badminton-esque indoor sports, including the sport in question today, which we will call Sport X.

So just to recap so far, since I know you are slow on the uptake, the completely, by definition, non-contact Sport X was required to get COVID tested because they play in a cavernous gymnasium, but a sport where it is impossible to wear a mask without literally dying, and you guard your opponent by putting your chin on their shoulder was exempt from testing because the pool they play in is in the sun.

As it happens, one of our water polo players also plays Sport X, and his test last week came back positive. So, in case you missed the memo, you sent the JV and Varsity water polo teams home, in addition to the whole team from Sport X. Thankfully, under your insane rules, we were dealing with a kid who actually got a positive test, and not just a “close contact.” And thankfully his parents weren’t having any of your BS and took the time to get him tested two more times, on two separate dates, as is your inane policy.

I guess they went to two labs that aren’t affiliated with the school district and use actual scientific lab equipment, because he came back negative both times. So, once again, you shut down three teams and sent 40+ kids away from classes for 5 days (instead of 14 – thank you awesome parents), canceling 20% of the water polo team’s games in an already shortened season for absolutely no reason at all.

Again, just to recap, 424 days after you shut schools completely down, you are still making the very life-altering decision of sending perfectly healthy children away from school and sports based on the findings of a lab that apparently gets their testing equipment from the Fisher-Price Lil’ Science Person collection at Walmart.

And again, to keep you up to date on your own policies, because I know none of you wrote any of them down, if he had just been “close contacted” in class, the negative test – like the one that Son Number Two got last week from Walgreens – would mean nothing. Like I said, thankfully under your “policy,” he had a positive test, which can get reversed by actual professionals. Simply being in the same room as someone who got a positive test from your source, Chuck’s Rapid COVID Testing Facility and Kosher Hotdog Stand, is irreversible. That’s neat.

A news article popped up in my feed last night that made me immediately think of you. The KCRA 3 headline was “Police arrest man after stolen sailboat gets stuck under Tower Bridge.”

Seems a gentleman down on the Sacramento River thought highly enough of his skillset to declare himself captain of a boat that didn’t belong to him. But when put to the test, it was revealed that he lacked the basic seamanship to understand the height of his vessel, the height of a lowered drawbridge, how drawbridges work, or even how to steer a sailboat.

It occurred to me that you are that so-called captain. You think highly enough of yourselves to take the job of shepherding our schools, but when put to the test by a flu bug that has been shown time and time again to have basically zero effect on students, you are still sailing into that drawbridge, week after week, month after month, and tragically for everyone involved, now year after year.

Captain Merrill Stupiding of the S.S. Dumbass was promptly arrested on the river last night and thrown in the brig. Sadly, in your case however, you sailed this boat square into the bridge, but when it get’s pointed out that you have no idea what you’re doing, it goes like this:

It’s not our fault. The state controls all bridge policy. It’s the state’s fault for putting the bridge there in the first place. It’s not our fault that the drawbridge wasn’t up when we got there, since there’s no way for someone to control one of those bridges or one of these sailboat things. I mean, we’re surrounded by water, for goodness sake. And besides that, the water is moving! And this big bridge right here came out of nowhere and hit our mast. Now if you’ll excuse us, we need to go collect our paychecks from the owner of this boat.

I really think we can do better than this, don’t you, skipper?

Yours in educational excellence through continued partnership,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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An Eighth Open Letter to the School District

Dear folks in charge of the decision making down at the School District,

I realize that on Cinco de Mayo, you would normally expect this column to be about my love of tacos and beer with limes, and the amazingly awesome tradition of the U.S. celebrating another country’s holiday with far more enthusiasm than they do, but alas, you have taken that away from me.

I was forced to write to you again today because yesterday, you sent Son Number Two home from school for two weeks. Yes, 417 calendar days after we began our 14-day curve flattening, school is still at my house.

To say that I don’t understand the reason for you “quarantining” my son is more than just a vast understatement, because to understand something, it first has to make at least some shred of sense. Let me walk you through what happened here and see if you can follow me:

Apparently, a kid in Son Number Two’s Spanish class tested positive for COVID. I have to assume it was COVID-21, because we can’t still be using the old COVID-19, can we? I mean, by definition, that thing is three years old already.

Now, I’m sure that kid was socially distancing from my son, as is the requirement on campus, and they were both wearing masks, as is also the requirement.

No pencils, pens, paper, erasers, computers, vapes, needles, water bottles, etc. were shared between the two, and they obviously did not touch each other’s desks, because that is strictly forbidden.

However, since my son was identified as one of the students at a desk most closely properly socially distanced from the lad with the positive test, my son was sent home to quarantine. (You will note that I said, “positive test,” and not “sick,” “ill,” or “contagious.” Those are important distinctions that are obviously lost on you.)

My son was not tested, nor did he have any symptoms of anything at all, other than a teenage attitude, but he was sent home, just in case.

Soooo… I have some questions.

First, the very obvious one. Why would my son be in danger of getting a virus from a kid if they were socially distanced and both wearing masks? I mean, it was safe to go back to school if the kids did those things, right? Do those things not work? Or are you unable to get the kids to comply with those rules?

Second, we have another son that attends the same school. Son Number One, who actually lives with Number Two, and doesn’t just sit adjacent to him at a desk with a mask on, is still allowed to show up on campus to learn. That luxury has been taken away from Son Number Two because you think he might also have the VID. So, we’re being super careful with Number Two because he may or may not be a ticking time bomb of disease, but I mean, what the hell – the kid he actually wrestles with at home can come on campus all he wants.

Thirdly, along the exact same lines, I am a water polo coach at the same school. I am also required to wear a mask and socially distance from the players (and we totally do that, by the way!). I also live with the ticking time bomb, yet you are totally cool with me showing up and coaching lots of kids from the school in my apparently useless mask.

And, not finally, but the last point that I have the patience to make – you require him to get tested around seven days after the date you said the alleged masked, distanced contamination occurred. If his test comes back positive, obviously he will be sealed into small, plastic-lined box and shipped overseas. But if it comes back negative, you will let him come back to school. You quarantined a perfectly healthy child, not knowing if he was secretly sick, but you’re going to let him back into school with that exact same amount of information.

You see, a negative COVID test tells you that the kid didn’t have COVID at the exact second the nasal swab left his nose. What if he got it while leaving the testing facility, by walking six feet apart from another masked kid there to get tested? And it takes anywhere from two to six days to get the results back from the lab, depending on how good the testing company’s governmental lobby is. That’s quite a bit of time for him to suck in some VID through one of these masks that block the virus or don’t.

I don’t have the energy, or enough crayons, to explain to you why none of this makes any sense at all. Just please know that the fact that you are making policies like this, coupled with the fact that you are in charge of the education of our youth, concerns me deeply.

I know I used a lot of big words there, so maybe you should take this to a teacher and have them explain it to you.

Yours in educational excellence through continued partnership,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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A Sixteenth Open Letter to Lifetouch School Portraits

Dear Lifetouch School Portraits,

School is only a month away from being over, and we never saw you on campus this year. I think it’s been a year and a half since we’ve seen each other! Surely you have finally had time to read my previous fifteen informative letters to you about your ridiculous business model and your general lack of photography skills. You desperately need to do so, because despite all my efforts to help you, on our last meeting, you actually said to the girl in front of Son Number Three, and I quote, “Oh, c’mon, give me a real smile.”

So as of early 2020 anyway, your hiring practices were still the same as they’ve always been:

Lifetouch: Are you currently breathing?

Unemployed person: Yes.

Lifetouch: Will you pass a background check?

UP: Yes.

Lifetouch: You’re hired.

UP: Umm… you guys heard me when I said I have no photography experience or experience with kids whatsoever, right. I actually thought this was a McDonald’s interview.

Lifetouch: Yep, you’re a perfect fit!

You’ve had a lot of free time and now that you’re owned by Shutterfly, surely you all have seen some of the pictures other people take to put in photobooks, on coffee mugs for grandma, mousepads, etc. You have to realize by now that it’s possible to take good pictures of children actually smiling. So, I assume you’ve spent the last eighteen months studying up on photography techniques, how to get children to genuinely smile, and what all the buttons do on your cameras, right?

No? Didn’t think so.

Here’s the crazy part, and the reason for my letter today. People with a phone that doubles as a camera (or the other way around, really) are able to take fantastic pictures of their smiling selves by just holding the device at arm’s length.

Do you realize what that means for you, the “professional photographers?” If people with a phone can take a better picture of themselves than you can of them, which you have proven time and time again to be the case, then that automatically invalidates the “professional” in your name.

It’s like going to a restaurant and paying $37 for a piece of burnt toast and the only jelly available is marmalade. We can make fantastic toast at our own homes for basically free, and we have a wide array of jam, jelly, and preserve options in our own refrigerators.

What I’m saying is, as far as photography goes, you make overpriced, crappy toast.

So here’s my new idea for you: Eliminate your photographer problem with the new Lifetouch Selfie App. On school picture day, kids will grab their cell phones and take selfies, then upload the one they want to your app. The school photos would then magically show up at their houses, printed on the fun glossy paper you guys have with the cool swirly blue school picture background automatically added in.

Photographer and COVID problems solved all in one little app. You’re welcome. I can’t wait to see what you come up with. Although, based on your previous track record, you will probably try to charge $39.99 for the app, it will freeze up and fail on Android devices, and only print pictures in sepia, but I’ve got my fingers crossed for you!

I will leave it with you and your app developers to handle the details, but I’m thinking your tagline could be, “Reach out and Lifetouch yourself!”

Or, maybe not.

Best of luck,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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2021 Hybrid Sports

Our school district decided they might as well let the kids go back to campus full-time after spring break, for the whopping 42 days left in the school year. Better late than never, I guess.

This means the kids also get to play sports again. But trying to schedule and accommodate all 26 high school programs at once has proven to be impossible, so the schools are being forced to combine some sports.

For instance, football, cross country, and golf have been combined to create a new co-ed hybrid this year, tentatively being called cross footgolf. A full 18 holes will be played, with the downs allowed being double what par used to be. So, on a traditional 560-yard par 5, teams would get 10 downs to reach the green.

The football will be advanced with running plays using the cross country athletes, but the entire opposing team gets to hit drives at them from the line of scrimmage on each down. Five offensive linemen may attempt to rush the golfers from the front if they choose. Any time the ball carrier is struck with a golf ball, the play is dead. (and often times, so is the runner and much of the O-line.) Reaching the green with downs to spare is considered a touchdown, and extra points are gained with putts from the fringe. The team with the lowest score for the 18-hole round wins.

Water polo has been added together with lacrosse to form watercrosse. Swimmers will now swim with lacrosse sticks and touching the ball with hands is no longer allowed. Lacrosse helmets will be worn for safety, which should be interesting. To allow for all 20 swimmers and proper lacrosse spacing, games will be played in Olympic-size pools, utilizing the entire 50 x 25-meter area, with floating goals in the field of play to allow for exciting behind the goal action. No survivors are expected.

Swimming and volleyball have been mixed and will be played in your neighbor’s pool with chips and hotdogs for everyone after the game. Please don’t splash dad over at the grill.

Tennis and basketball have been combined to form tennisball. A regulation-height tennis net will be added across half court, with full basketball teams on both sides along with two pairs of mixed doubles. The tennis players are allowed to defend with their rackets, while all other basketball rules remain in place. Touching any part of the net while transitioning down court results in penalty free throws, while the opposing mixed doubles team hits serves at you from anywhere on their side of the court.

In an easy and intuitive mix, softball, baseball, and soccer have been combined into one giant kickball game. The fun added twist, however, is the addition of the wrestling team. Wrestleball will feature two defending wrestlers stationed at each base, including home plate. In order to advance safely to the base, you must first get through the wrestlers. To even out the odds, runners are allowed to bring their bats. Should be fun.

And finally, stunt has been paired up with track and field. All traditional running events are now required to contain a minimum of six front flips or back handsprings for every 100 meters. Relay events will have the same flip requirements, and the baton will be replaced with a giant hair bow, that must be transferred and perfectly affixed to the next runner’s hair before they can advance.

Javelin, shot put, and hammer toss will all be performed from the top position on the human pyramid. Pole vaulting will remain unchanged, because that event is crazy enough on its own.

Best of luck to all participants! I would tell you parents to enjoy the competitions, but unfortunately, spectators are still not allowed.

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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Crypto-cartography

You probably woke up this morning wondering, “What wacky geographical oddities can come from the accidental or purposeful intersection of cryptography and cartography?”

Am I right?

Of course I am, and the answer is quite obvious: Point Roberts, Washington.

If you are not familiar, I will give you a few minutes now to look it up on Google maps…

OK, you’re back, and you obviously just said to yourself, whose idiotic idea was that?? Was the guy drawing the map drunk?

The answer is, probably yes. (And also, The Tipsy Cartographers would be a great name for a rock band.)

No matter the sobriety level of the map makers, after the war of 1812 they created a goofy little puzzle on the upper left corner of Washington, but couldn’t quite put their collective finger on the glaringly obvious answer.

 

British and American map meeting:

OK, so about midway across Minnesota we’re gonna stop following the rivers and just draw a straight line across this sucker on the 49^th parallel, and boom, we’ve got ourselves a border.

What about Vancouver Island out in the Pacific? That line will go straight across the middle of it.

How about we make the line angled and squiggly once we get into the water? The British can have Vancouver Island and the U.S. will take the San Juans? Cool?

Cool.

OK, great work everyone. Let’s go have some more beers.

 

A month later:

Um, we have a little situation out in Washington. We checked a little closer, and the 49^th kinda cuts off a little piece of what should totally be Canada, right up here in the corner, see?

What the hell, Roberts? You drew the line. What were you thinking?

Sorry, sir. We didn’t know that little point stuck out so far. But it’ll be an easy fix.

Nope, Nothing we can do now.

Um… all I have to do is squiggle the line a little sooner.

No can do.

But nobody lives there, yet. It’s less than five square miles.

Nope.

Um… so the plan is to have a small American town that you literally can’t leave by road unless you go through Canada?

That’s exactly what has to happen now, Roberts. We’ll pretend we planned it. No other way around it.

But there is a very easy way. Like I said, I can just…

Roberts! You’re being insubordinate! Just for that I’m going to name it after you, so you’ll always remember your failure.

Um… yes, sir.

 

A month later:

Sir?

What is it, Elm?

We have a little situation in Muskeg Bay in Minnesota…

 

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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A Seventh Open Letter to the School District

Dear folks in charge of the decision making down at the School District,

On March 13, 2020 you sent our kids home from school and told us we were all going to quarantine for two weeks to “flatten the curve.”

Yesterday, 389 calendar days after we began our 14-day curve flattening, our kids finally attended classes on campus for a full school day.

Since you are in charge of the schools, I assume you can do the math on how lame that is, but then again, maybe not.

There isn’t anything you can do to make it up to the high school seniors who graduated from home in their pajamas last year, and not much more you can do for the current students, other than to make sure you never do this again.

And before you start getting all defensive and telling me that it wasn’t your fault and there was nothing you could do, and you did your best, blah, blah, I have to ask you - Whose job is it to keep the schools open and running? And be careful with your answer, because if it’s not you, then we don’t need you…

Now that you’ve come to terms with how poorly you’ve done your job over the last 389 days, there is one group of people that you can definitely make it up to. Your inability or unwillingness to do the one thing you’re actually supposed to be doing has caused our teachers more grief than they ever should have had to deal with. They already have to deal with teenagers, for goodness sake!

Between all-virtual, back on campus, and some mix of the two, my boys’ teachers have had to completely change the way they taught their classes a minimum of four times this year. I realize that doesn’t affect you over at your offices, but rest assured, it greatly affected the folks you’re charged with shepherding – the students and their teachers. Not to mention, you turned me into a very unwilling homeschool teacher, which wasn’t good for anyone. Trust me!

Here’s what I propose you do for our teachers: Take a good hard look at your staffing levels over at the district office. Make a list of the absolutely essential personnel, and really drill it down to just the bare minimum amount of folks required to run your operations.

When you have that list in hand, fire all the people on the list and keep all the people you regarded as non-essential. Maybe they’ll keep the schools open next time. No doubt they’ll do a much better job than you did.

They can choose to stick around and run things at 50% of their current salaries, and we’ll take the other 50% along with the massive salaries freed up from all you “essential” personnel and give it all to the teachers – this year and going forward.

That’s the best solution. The teachers are, as evidenced, the only ones working for these kids.

Full disclosure: My wife is a teacher, so this is all very self-serving on a number of levels, but that doesn’t make it any less true.

Yours in educational excellence through continued partnership,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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Thumb Drive

The thing you have to realize as a parent is that kids – especially teenagers – are genetically programmed to argue with you. It is basically their job, and they will never stop and they will never tire. They will argue with you continuously until you actually die of starvation and they will still be going strong. They are like little arguing robots with an infinite loop nonsense-generating algorithm and a small onboard nuclear reactor for power.

This is tolerable for the seasoned parent when they choose to argue with you about their hair, or their bedtime, or the laughable idea of getting a cat. We can deal with that stuff. The problems arise when they try to defend utterly ridiculous positions on important topics such as professional sports.

These arguments cannot be tolerated by the responsible parent, because we are tasked with eventually sending them out into the world to do good and be smart. If they leave the house with the idiotic notion that playing a football video game and playing an actual football game are even remotely similar to each other, then we have failed them, ourselves, and society at large. We can’t have that.

Case in point – yesterday at the beach. We are on spring break from their rigorous schedule this year of staying home from school, so we decided to pack up and head for the beach to visit their grandma. She was nice enough to get a friend who happens to be a retired professional surfer to give Son Number Two a surf lesson yesterday.

He did really well and spent a couple hours out in the surf, paddling his butt off, missing waves, falling off, getting rolled, choking on salt water, and occasionally catching a wave and standing up to surf it. We were proud of him.

As we were packing up to leave, we watched and laughed as a guy standing on shore near the water was putting on a little show. He had a small motorized remote-controlled surfboard, about a foot long, with a little plastic surfer riding on top. It was zipping around out in the water surfing up and down the waves. When it crashed, it just popped right back up and kept zipping around.

Apparently, there are quite a few folks who have these little things, and they get together and hold surf contests. Son Number One, who had decided not to try surfing and instead sat on the beach for two hours, then amazingly attempted to make the argument that actual surfing and remote-control toy surfing were almost indistinguishable from each other in skill level.

I had been out in the water for a couple hours too, so I was tired and my head was cold, but I still managed to nearly roll my eyes out of my skull. As I began to open my mouth to set him straight, the sheer insanity of his position triggered a repressed memory from three days earlier on the drive down to the beach.

Somewhere on Interstate 5, Son Number One made the ridiculous claim that me watching professional athletes play sports on TV was exactly the same as him watching YouTubers play video games with each other.

“Because it just isn’t and that is just super obvious” was, of course, not a good enough reason for his little, non-functioning teenage brain.

This was not one of those arguments that I could just let go, because as we discussed earlier, I would be failing all of humanity if I produce a working-age human who thinks this way.

He continued spouting his ridiculous, mind-numbing arguments for why being a professional athlete was totally the exact same thing as being something he called a “professional gamer.”

I quickly got to the point of almost not being able to keep the car on the road due to the mental anguish I was experiencing from the conversation, even though I-5 is probably the straightest freeway in America. I needed to stop the conversation, for the safety of the whole family.

I settled on this: “Getting out of bed when everything hurts to go again. That’s the difference.”

“But when you lose at Fortnite for the hundredth time in a row, it’s the same thing to go back and try again!”

“Oh, my God, you’re just using your thumbs! Shut up!”

“You use more than your thumbs, dad.”

“SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP!!!”

The conversation on the beach didn’t go much better.

I don’t know what worries me more – the fact that kids these days aren’t making a distinction between actual sports and “e-sports,” the fact that kids actually spend their time watching other kids play video games, or the fact that they probably all think that’s the same thing as watching people play an actual sport.

And Son Number One is only a couple of years from going off to college. We obviously still have a lot of work to do to get him ready to go out into the world.

Speaking of colleges, the situation with this e-sports nonsense is far more dire than you might think. Did you know there are actually colleges that are offering scholarships for e-sports?

And I’m not talking about ITT Tech, either. Formerly respectable institutions like Ohio State University, Hawaii Pacific, University of Texas at Dallas, and the University of California at Irvine all offer some level of scholarship for you to come there and play video games.

Arcadia University in Glenside, PA actually has a $25,000 scholarship for e-sports! Can you believe tha…

Wait, what? Twenty-five grand?

Hey, son, how are you at something called League of Legends? I’ve been hearing great things about Pennsylvania these days…

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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A Sixth Open Letter to the School District

Dear folks in charge of the decision making down at the School District,

As a reminder, we are on school day 292 of our 14-day quarantine to flatten the COVID curve, and I wanted to write again to let you know that apparently, all trust has been lost between us. Which is weird, because our relationship is predicated on me trusting you to educate my children, so I would have thought there would be an equal reciprocal trust on your end toward me, but I guess not.

I received an email last night from one of the high school coaches, relaying a message he had received from the Athletic Director. Since spring has sprung here in California, allergy season is ramping up quickly.

Here’s the note from the AD:

With allergy season upon us, if your athletes have a runny nose/red eyes/etc. they will be sent home from school and quarantined if nothing is in their file regarding allergies. I would encourage them to have their parents call the school nurse and get their allergies logged into their health profile.

Now, I realize that common sense is a 2019 thing, so I won’t take up any of your time with my thoughts on the insanity of quarantining a kid whose only symptom is itchy eyes and is standing there telling you they have allergies.

I discovered our trust had evaporated when I followed the AD’s advice this morning and phoned the school to update Son Number One’s health profile because he does, in fact, have allergies.

I was told that there was no possible way they could update his health profile based on my word alone, and they would need a note from the doctor to confirm that he really, truly does have seasonal allergies.

Umm…

We here at the house have been providing his direct and total care since he first saw the light of day. That has been sixteen years, now. I can assure you we are not pumping him full of Zyrtec and Flonase because we love spending the money on it.

I’m not 100% sure why you think I should trust you implicitly with the education of my children if you are unwilling to trust me as a parent on the simple fact that pollen really irritates my oldest son’s nasal passages. That seems “fairly academic,” to put it in school terms.

Since we give him what we out here in the real world call “over-the-counter” medication for his seasonal allergies that did not need official medical diagnosis here in the central valley of California, where seasonal allergies were invented, I can’t provide a doctor’s note in this instance.

Being as such, I thought I’d take this opportunity to alert you of some other possible non-officially-diagnosed situations that might arise with my boys while they are at school.

Son Number One swims and plays water polo, so occasionally in the pool he will cough. The non-official term for this is “choking on a bunch of water.” This is not COVID related.

Son Number Two plays lacrosse on a turf field. When he falls on that field while running, he can get what we call “turf burns” on his knees, elbows, etc. These rashes will be red and angry looking, but rest assured they are harmless and non-communicable.

All three of my sons tend to sneeze when exposed to clouds of dust or pepper. This reaction is a natural bodily function, I’ve been told, so no need for alarm or any quarantining in those situations.

Son Number Three also plays lacrosse, but in a hilarious turn of events, does not enjoy running. He is also quite dramatic, as seventh graders can be, so after a practice, game, or workout, he tends to fake limp around to let you know how much effort he gave and that it is almost killing him. This limp, real or for show, is not a sign of muscle cramping due to COVID or any other current pandemic disease we are employing to keep kids out of your hair.

All three of my boys will occasionally become very thirsty. This is because they are teenagers who forget to drink water regularly, not a sign of illness-born dehydration. You can just point them toward the nearest drinking fountain that you have shut off because drinking fountains don’t spread diseases, but better safe than sorry.

Speaking of thirst, it’s about to get hot again here in the Golden State. Since my boys play sports and compete outside, they do tend to warm up a tad when the mercury starts rising. I know you are all armed with handy touchless thermometers, but be aware they might register a little on the warm side when out in the blazing sun. Remember, 98.7 is not cause for quarantining. In fact, if they are below 103, please send then for another lap.

Lastly, with regard to my last letter to you folks, you have been handing out some pretty questionable “food” in your free grab-n-go lunches. (And by “free,” I obviously mean they will be paid for by my grandchildren’s grandchildren, at this point.) Please be aware that as teenage boys, my sons will eat anything you hand them. Due to their teenage metabolism, they are in a perpetual state of near-starvation no matter how much food we give them, so please don’t take their willingness to eat the highly processed, should-be-illegal-in-schools crap you are handing them as a sign of any lost sense of smell or taste. They are just boys.

I hope that we can someday build back the trust that we’ve lost between us, but the ball is squarely in your court on that one. I look forward to you taking my word unconditionally on the health and safety of my own children in the very near future. That would be neat, wouldn’t it?

Yours in educational excellence through continued partnership,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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Cinco de Ulysses Patrick's Day

Today is St. Patrick’s Day, so I am obviously wearing my “Kiss Me, I’m Irish-ish” shirt, but I’m not very festive, otherwise. “Why?”, you might ask. Because today is Wednesday. Who has a holiday on a Wednesday?

St. Patrick’s Day is a strange “holiday.” It’s the Cinco de Mayo of March, and both are on a fixed calendar date, which makes no sense. Both have some amount of green added to the beer, and no one from the holidays’ countries of origin celebrates them. Here in the USA, however, we embrace them like they were the Fourth of July or New Years. And much like New Years, no one knows what we’re celebrating or why. But we’re all Irish for one day in March, and we’re all Mexican for one dia in Mayo.

The problem is the only people who get to celebrate these two “holidays” with any regularity are students. Specifically, college kids and elementary schoolers. The college kids use the days as excuses to party, and the elementary schools use them as excuses to make leprechaun traps, Mexican flags, and most importantly, eat cookies.

Meanwhile, we adults have to wait until March 17^th or May 5^th land on a weekend before we get to party anymore. Why should the students get to have all the fun? Why shouldn’t the parents get to participate?

We used to have fun on St. Patrick’s Day. We used to drink green beer and actively look for other college kids of the opposite sex who weren’t wearing green so we could pinch them, as is the standard custom.

We used to have fun on Cinco de Mayo. We used to drink Corona with lime and eat discounted tacos by the truckload while wearing giant sombreros, and actively look for other college kids of the opposite sex who weren’t wearing green so we could pinch them, as is the standard custom.

Did we know why we did any of this? Of course not. Did we care that we didn’t know? Of course not. We cared about doing our part to uphold centuries of fake traditions. We cared about beer with the appropriate green holiday additive. We cared about pinching cute members of the opposite sex. We cared.

I’m tired of being left out. I’m tired of not caring. I want to care again. We should get to party, too. It’s only right, since we’re the ones paying for all of this anyway. Why shouldn’t we get these days off work?

Why? I’ll tell you why. Probably because someone still needs to pay for all this, that’s why. But are we going to let that stop us? Heck no! There are plenty of other days during the year we can work. Although, we do already have a lot of holidays…

OK, let’s compromise. We could combine St. Patrick’s Day and Cinco de Mayo into one holiday to minimize the work stoppage but still have some fun. What do you say?

I knew you’d be on board!

Ladies and gentlemen, I officially propose a new national holiday.

We will compromise on the month and have the new holiday in April, since it has always been a travesty that we don’t get April 27^th off for President Ulysses S. Grant’s birthday either. We will anchor it around that date but it will need to float, of course, to always fall on a Friday so this party is a three-day weekend. It’s only fitting to include Grant, since he really should be the patron saint of these two holidays anyway. You may not know this, but in addition to being a war hero and a Roman god, Ulysses was a prolific inventor and actually invented, among many other things, the taco, green beer, the piñata, and Ireland.

We shall call the new holiday either Dia de St. Mayo Patrick de Grant, or Cinco de Ulysses Patrick’s Day. We can vote on that later.

As far as logistics go, we will simply combine all the current fake holiday traditions into one big three-day weekend of awesome.

The holiday uniforms can remain mostly undefined, but should include the required holiday colors; green, white and red, with an obvious emphasis on green and large sombreros.

Mariachi bands will need to shift their focus a little and include bagpipes and plaid. Irish heel-clicking salsa dancing with be a natural follower to the new groove.

The main holiday beverage will obviously be green Corona with yellow lemon wedges instead of limes to signify lucky gold. Cuervo gold tequila will remain unchanged, since it satisfies both holiday motifs. As an alternative to Mexican tequila, Irish mojitos will be made out of crushed clover and Jameson Irish Whiskey.

Red, white, and green tortilla chips will be served with cabbage salsa, and children across the land will spend the new holiday smacking leprechaun-shaped piñatas filled with gold coin chocolates and corned beef taquitos.

We can work out the rest of the details later. I’m not really sure who’s in charge of new holiday creation over in D.C., so if one of you could forward this on to them, that’d be great.

I’m going to get back to my green Corona.

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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He’s Thirteen – That’s Ninety-One in Internet Years

Big news here at Just a Smidge World Headquarters – Son Number Three is turning thirteen next month, and you know what that means! No, not that.

It means he’s only a few weeks away from computer independence! That makes sense, since under the HIPAA laws, he became medically independent last year at age twelve. It only follows that he would gain his digital independence, also.

I just can’t believe those two things don’t happen on the same birthday. It seems kinda mean to tell him he has full control over his medical records and decisions, but not give him unfettered access to the internet at the same time. I guess logic hasn’t caught up with this branch of our government yet.

Now, I must admit that up until a few weeks ago I wasn’t fully aware of his impending digital freedom. Microsoft was kind enough to send me an email about it:

This 13^th birthday brings some changes. Son Number Three is getting older, so we wanted to give you a heads up about some changes coming to their account. Privacy laws in your region make it so they have more control over different settings on their account, so it’s a good opportunity to talk about what this means for your whole family.

Ahh, privacy laws in my region. That makes sense. We can’t have the thirteen-year-olds around these parts getting online and being dogged by their parents all day. These young adults need the God- and government-given freedom to go explore the dark corners of the internet on their own.

Microsoft went on to explain what my son gets for his thirteenth birthday, besides horribly traumatized, of course:

Stuff that's changing:

Activity reporting

They can turn off your ability to see their activity on Windows 10 and Xbox One devices, or Android devices running Microsoft Launcher.

Oh, excellent. Right off the bat this is sounding super logical. Heaven forbid I would get to see what my child is doing on their computer.

Device health

They can turn off your ability to see their device and check on updates, hard drive usage, or safety settings like firewall and anti-virus protection.

I guess that makes sense. For a year now he has been able to go take care of any human viruses on his own over at the doctor’s office, so why not let him choose whether we let in any computer viruses as well. I’m sure he’ll make good decisions.

Find your child

They can stop sharing their location through their Windows 10 phone or Android device running Microsoft Launcher.

Again, kudos on the logic here. Why would I want to be able to find my own child? I mean, he might have a secret doctor’s appointment and doesn’t want me following him. Makes sense.

Then Microsoft doubled down on all this good thirteen-year-old logic:

Is this birthdate wrong? Have them update it.

Yes, again, good call. If the birthday is wrong, let’s let the young child handle all the fixing.

“Son, the internet thinks you’re older than you are. Can you log onto your Microsoft account real quick and change your birthday to be younger so you don’t get into anything you shouldn’t? Thanks a bunch, buddy!”

At the end of the email, Microsoft provided me with perhaps the most useful suggestions of all:

Help them celebrate

Add money to their Microsoft account

Get a game that they've been checking out in the Microsoft Store

Useful for Microsoft, I mean.

Well, enjoy your unfettered access to the World Wide Web, son. See you at the psychiatrist’s office.

Oh, wait. You’re over twelve. I guess I won’t.

 

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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I'm Getting No Emotional Support Up Here

Well, the emotionally supported fun is over. I have an upcoming flight on Southwest Airlines, and they sent me an email last week to remind me that as of Monday the 1st, my emotional support wolverine will no longer be welcome on the plane.

Travel notice: Starting March 1, Southwest Airlines will no longer accept emotional support animals and only dogs will be accepted as trained service animals with appropriate documentation.

Well, that’s a fine how do you do! I called customer service to ask about my alternate emotional support badger or at least my emotional support ferret, and the answers were still no. The nerve.

How am I supposed to keep the sweaty, smelly guy from sitting in the middle seat and crowding my armrest now? And what am I supposed to do with all this foaming white chicken-flavored toothpaste I used to put on their little lips to make them look rabid?

I guess the airlines have their reasons. I mean, there was the woman at Bradley International in Connecticut who was allowed to bring her eighty-pound emotional support pig onto a US Airways flight a while back. It went bad pretty quickly when the other passengers immediately started gagging from the stench of all the emotional support, and that was before the pig actually pooped in the aisle and then began screeching when the now emotionally unsupported owner tried to clean up the mess.

And the poor little emotional support animals sometimes didn’t even make it onto the plane if their paperwork wasn’t in order. There was even a tragic case where an emotional support hamster didn’t make it at all. Lacking the proper documentation outlining his emotional support cred, Pebbles the dwarf hamster was denied plane privileges at the ticket counter. His owner, a college student who obviously needed more emotional support than one tiny rodent could provide, tried for hours to find another way home. After she exhausted every single possibility, with the obvious exception of a ton of other possibilities, she flushed poor Pebbles down an airport toilet in order to be rodent-free and fully emotionally unsupported for her flight.

I would argue that if you were willing to flush the very hamster that was supposed to bring you emotional support, you didn’t need an emotional support hamster in the first place. You needed a team of emotional support human therapists.

But be hopeful for little Pebbles! As someone who has personally witnessed a large black rat go down one toilet into the sewer pipe only to pop out of another toilet moments later, I remain convinced that Pebbles probably maybe made his way through the swirling vortex and into the airport sewer system, alive and well. And maybe after an epic hamster adventure filled with twists and turns, the little guy eventually made his way up a main sewer line vent shaft and out onto the airfield, where he was probably sucked into a jet engine, or eaten by a large hawk. Either way, he went out like a hero. Godspeed, Pebbles.

But let’s forget about all the pigs, ducks, bunnies, peacocks, and doomed hamsters that led us to this moment. I believe the straw that broke the emotional support camel’s back was Daisy.

In a story that only could have happened in Florida, a flight from Orlando to Cleveland was delayed for two hours when passenger Cindy Torok refused to exit the plane after flight attendants discovered her emotional support animal was, in fact, a squirrel. All the other passengers had to get off the plane while the authorities bargained with Cindy in a classic rodent standoff situation. Thankfully, the negotiations ended peacefully after the Orlando police threatened to arrest Cindy and confiscate Daisy. Cindy was quoted as replying, “You’re not taking my squirrel. Sorry, you’re not. I refuse. You will not take my baby from me.”

As emotional support requirements go, I am assuming, based on the two-hour standoff, that Cindy is pretty high up on the list. What she failed to realize, however, is simple a fact that the Federal Aviation Administration, the National Transportation Safety Board, The American Psychiatric Association, and the Future Farmers of America have all known for years: squirrels are naturally incapable of providing emotional support. They do the exact opposite. Squirrels are evil.

I once had a squirrel, in a totally unprovoked attack, chew through the wires on the two end bulbs on my string of patio bistro lights, completely removing them from each end the string. This vindictive devil rodent then placed the now destroyed and useless pigtailed sockets and bulbs ever-so-delicately on very edge of the patio cover roof so that I could see them from the ground.

No animal capable of providing even an ounce of emotional support would ever be capable of such a heinous crime against warm and charming outdoor patio lighting.

In a glaring example of her need for support on many, many levels, Cindy was oblivious to the fact that she had brought a creature of pure evil and destruction onto a plane that needed to stay in the air all the way to Ohio. If that little hell beast had gotten loose into the wiring harnesses under the cabin floor it could have easily taken down that aircraft before they had even cleared Georgia.

Thusly, and sadly, thanks to Cindy and Daisy, the emotional support animal ride is over for the rest of us.

Does anyone want to buy a pet wolverine?

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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This Round Finally Goes to the Husband

My wife and I had a major breakthrough in our marriage on Monday. And by breakthrough, I mean I won a round.

As you have no doubt heard at countless weddings, 1 Corinthians 13 tells us that love is patient, love is kind, blah, blah, blah, “love keeps no record of wrongs.” That part is not true. Every married couple keeps records of wrongs, and I am WAY behind in the count.

But on Monday, my wife actually conceded that she had been wrong about a long-held belief regarding the messiness of one of my personal hygiene habits. I am talking, of course, about my weekly high colonic. Ha! No! Just kidding. Don’t stop reading. I’m actually talking about brushing my teeth.

If you are married, or share a sink with anyone, and that sink has a mirror above it, then you are all too painfully familiar with the toothpaste-spittle-splatter-on-the-mirror debate.

Wife: Look at these spots all over the mirror!

Husband: OK.

Wife: That is gross!

Husband: Not really.

Wife: Yes it is! They’re from toothbrushing and they’re all from you!

Husband: No way those are all from me.

Wife: Yes they are! They’re not from me, so it must be you.

Husband: Oh, OK.

Wife: OK? Is that all you have to say about all these gross spots on the mirror??

Husband: [runs away, if he knows what’s good for him]

My beautiful wife was so convincing in her denials of spittle culpability and so adamant about my overall toothbrushing grossness, that I never even questioned her. (That probably comes from a veteran husband survival instinct, more than anything.)

But the pearly white dental tables have turned. We were talking with friends the other night who were raving about their activated charcoal toothpaste. Yes, for those of you like myself who had never heard of this stuff, I mean jet-black, Kingston briquette, charcoal. In toothpaste.

They convinced us that it tastes just like normal minty toothpaste, even though it looks like a tube of graphite grease, but in a completely opposite-of-what-you-think-is-going-to-happen way, actually whitens your teeth. So my beloved wife made a special trip to Target just for charcoal toothpaste, and naturally came home with a couple workout shirts, some leggings, $349 worth of makeup and shampoo, some throw pillows, and a food processor.

Oh, and the crazy black toothpaste.

She brushed her teeth with the new toothpaste Monday night while I was also in the bathroom.

After smiling at me, mid-brush, to show me that she looked like she had just licked the inside of a barbecue, she rinsed and checked out her teeth in the mirror to gauge any immediate change in whiteness.

And then the miracle happened. No, she did not go back to Target to return everything. She stopped looking in the mirror and started looking at the mirror, and boom!

She said, “Well, I guess I can’t blame you for the toothpaste mirror spots anymore.”

Score one for the husbands of the world! Can you believe it? We got a win, boys!

She actually called herself out on it! She had dark black toothpaste spittle spots on the mirror, and they were most undeniably hers. I didn’t even bother to inspect the mirror. I just played it totally cool and gave her a small laugh and a shrug, like, “Whatcha gonna do?” (More veteran husband survival instinct there. Take note, new guys.)

The record of wrongs is not a written document, you see. It’s a mental tally, and by playing it cool I scored more points than I ever could have if I had been the one to point it out. Of course, I could never be the one to point it out, because as a man, I am physically incapable of seeing the spots on the mirror in the first place.

And that is the main reason why I will NEVER use the charcoal toothpaste myself. Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t mind having whiter teeth. I’m just scared to death of what the mirror is going to look like when I’m done. All my new plus points would be instantly erased.

Good luck out there, gentlemen.

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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This Column is Going Downhill Again

Our regularly scheduled column has been rudely preempted by Ski Week, again!!

Yes, that’s right, I said Ski Week. Instead of celebrating the glorious birthdays of Martin Van Buren and William Henry Harrison on two separate Mondays in February, like we all did when we were young, our school district changed things up a few years ago. Apparently, they think we’re all rich.

They tacked on three extra president’s days to the previous two, and lined them all up in a row this week. This phenomenon is nicknamed “Ski Week,” so the idea, apparently, is that we’re all supposed to head up to the slopes and spend the education-free week on a ski vacation. I guess I forgot to let our school district know that we don’t have thirty-eight thousand dollars lying around for just such an occasion.

And our school district failed to check with any of the surrounding districts to see if they were also populated by the idle rich and doing the same thing. Turns out they’re not. Since my wife teaches in a neighboring district, our ski week, could we afford it, would be momless.

Sure, we might be able to shave a few thousand bucks off the total cost with one less lift ticket and no overpriced ski lodge chardonnay, but if you think I’m taking these three monkeys skiing by myself, you’ve obviously been drinking something a lot stronger than wine.

So, what I’m telling you is, the kids in Rocklin, which unfortunately includes MY kids, have the ENTIRE damn week off. And not only that, but this particular week has weekends on BOTH sides of it! Do you know what that means? It means my three boys have been here at home with me now for five whole days in a row already, and we still have four more whole days, also in that row, left before they go back to school.

Those of you with kids, or those of you who have met kids before, should now understand the fact that I’ve got nothing done in the last five days, and that trend will continue for the next four. In particular, I haven’t been able to write this column. I haven’t been able to do anything useful. (Author’s note to aspiring writers: Take notice of how I deftly implied that this column is actually useful through the trickery of italics, even though there is absolutely no historical evidence that would support that claim.)

So, to all of you who are not currently on a weeks-long ski vacation, I apologize for not having a column for you today. I don’t know why our school district is choosing not to celebrate the President’s Days as our forefathers intended, but one thing is certain – our distinguished eighth and ninth presidents are rolling over in their ornate, gold and diamond-encrusted graves.

As for you folks who are swooshing down the slopes this week and sipping expensive ski lodge cocktails in plush leather chairs in front of magnificent fireplaces while I spend another day eating cold pizza and refereeing at the World Brothers Wrestling Federation, I’ll say this:

I am NOT sorry that I don’t have a column for you this week. You’re probably too busy to read it anyway, what with all your swooshing, and expensive sipping, and plush fireplace sitting, and stacking gold coins in your Rolls Royce, and snorting caviar, and whatever else it is you people do.

But I’m not bitter. I would never wish for you to have a skiing accident and break a bone or anything like that. That’s just not right.

But I do kinda wish you’d fall off your wallet in the lodge and get a mild sprain.

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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There's a Problem with Facebook

Ladies and gentlemen, I am here today to report on a potentially serious problem I discovered last night. No, not that I’m so old I can hurt myself by sleeping wrong. I already knew about that problem. I’m talking about Facebook. I think it might have a huge glitch.

I got into bed last night, and as usual, said my prayers for an injury-free night of sleep. I was just about to close my eyes when I noticed the blue glow of a computer screen coming from my office down the hall. Realizing I had forgotten to shut my computer down, I hauled myself out of bed and headed down the hall to turn it off.

I got back into bed forty-five minutes later.

When I got to my computer, Facebook was up on the browser. I went to shut the computer off, but Facebook made me name my rock band first by combining the color of my underwear with the last thing I ate. We are the Blue and White Nachos. I was then forced to pick between four different trays of delicious fried food. There was a crawfish and fries tray, a wings and tater tots tray, a garlic bread and mac ’n cheese tray, and a mini burgers and fries tray. It was a very difficult decision that I agonized over for a while, but ultimately I had to go with the wings and tater tots because of my love of the tot.

I was then told that my earlobes were the same distance apart as my nipples, so I had to go check that in the mirror and it was a lie. I went back to shut off the computer but I had to take an ‘80s movie challenge first. The question was simply how many of the twenty movies listed had I seen, but the average score was shown as thirty-nine percent, which was ridiculous. I murdered that score. I had seen all of them except one. I then had to email myself a reminder to finally see Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

I went back to the browser to shut off Facebook but before I could I had to watch a ten-minute animated video on how Pablo Escobar spent his billions of dollars in drug money. That was followed by a Mexican restaurant life hack video where you get a Styrofoam to-go container, but instead of taking your tacos home, you pour your margarita in there and then punch a little straw hole in the top of the lid. I was making a mental note to tell my wife about the margarita trick, and also about how Pablo Escobar had two submarines and his own zoo, but got sidetracked by some kid going absolutely crazy at a Georgia Tech welcome speech, followed by the first seven minutes of Conan O’Brien’s 2011 Dartmouth commencement address.

The rabbit hole had quite a few twists and turns from there, ultimately terminating in a video of a guy cutting a frozen bass out of an iced-over lake with a chainsaw. When he got the chunk of bass-filled ice free and pulled it out, there was a frozen pike underneath with its teeth clamped to the tail end of the bass.

At that point, as I glazed over wondering just how fast that lake actually froze over, my mouse cursor was finally able to reach all the way up to the log out button, and I was finally able to shut my computer down. I’m not even sure how it happened, but I was simply unable to get out of the Facebook program until that point. Due to this programming flaw, whatever it is, I lost almost a full hour of sleep.

I hope you’re not experiencing the same problem with your Facebook account, but being that it’s a web-based program, I suspect you might be. I really think we ought to let someone over there at Facebook HQ know about this so they can look into it.

I think they’ll be genuinely surprised at how much of our time they’re accidentally wasting!

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

Your new favorite T-shirt is at SmidgeTees

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Ask Smidge - The Groundhog Edition

Yesterday was Groundhog Day, a magical day when we finally get an accurate weather report from a truly trusted source: the ghost of Willard Scott. Just kidding. (A quick Google search tells us he’s somehow still alive.)

No, obviously we get our weather predictions from a huge rodent. Punxsutawney Phil emerged from his burrow after a long winter’s hibernation, saw a news report that 2021 was still just as bad as 2020, and immediately went back down in for six more weeks of hiding from it all.

Our asksmidge@gmail.com inbox has understandably been flooded with groundhog-related questions. You don’t know how this odd tradition works, who is in charge, what a Punxsutawney is, or even what a groundhog is. We are here for you, and let me be the first to reassure you all – you have come to the right place.

The Ask Smidge advice column should always be your first stop for any questions about meteorology, zoology, geographology historology, or rodentology. We went to college for far longer than you’re actually supposed to, after all.

 

Smidge,

What exactly is a groundhog? We don’t have anything like that in Hawaii.

Wondering in Waimea

Dear Wondering,

You have rats and mongooses in Hawaii, so just imagine if those two species somehow got together and produced a very fat, slow, drunk uncle. That’s what a groundhog is.

 

 

Smidge,

Are groundhogs and woodchucks the same thing?

Questioning in Queens

 

Dear Questioning,

Yes, groundhogs are also known as woodchucks. Good call. So, once you know that, it begs the question of how much ground would a groundhog hog, if a groundhog could hog ground. (And I believe they can hog ground better than they can chuck wood.) Groundhogs are related to squirrels and are a member of the marmot family. Not to be confused with the Marmot company that makes insanely expensive jackets, using, as far as we know, no part of the marmot family. Amazingly, groundhogs are also called whistle pigs. (We are not making that up.) Not to be confused with the Whistle Pig company that makes insanely expensive whiskey, again, as far as we know, using no part of the whistle pig itself.

 

 

Smidge,

Why is Punxsutawney Phil named Punxsutawney Phil? What the hell is a Punxsutawney?

Confused in Columbus

Dear Confused,

Punxsutawney is actually the name of a town in Pennsylvania, roughly sixty miles northeast of Pittsburgh, which is another town in Pennsylvania that has never sounded like somewhere you’d want to live. Or even visit. Punxsutawney is where Phil lives and was named when they completely ran out of normal names for towns in Pennsylvania and just decided to dump all the Scrabble letters onto the table and see what lined up. Much like how my forefathers came up with Schmatjen.

 

 

Smidge,

Why do they use a groundhog to predict the arrival of spring?

Perplexed in Peoria

 

Dear Perplexed,

It was an accident. The people of Punxsutawney are constantly drunk. I’m talking like 24/7 hammered. They originally thought it was a small, fat, magical weather dog.

 

 

Smidge,

Has the pandemic affected Phil’s prognostication?

Quarantined in Quebec

 

Dear Quarantined,

While the American whistle pig and its weather predicting abilities seem to be immune to COVID, the pandemic did put a big damper on the annual hoopla in Punxsutawney. The Groundhog Day Festival normally takes place at a hill called Gobbler’s Knob. It is the highest point in Pennsylvania and was named after the town’s founder and Scrabble game owner, Phil Gobbler. (No relation.) Literally hundreds of tourists from as far away as the next town over usually gather at Phil’s burrow (the woodchuck, not the founder) to watch the weather-predicting rodent do his thing. This year’s event had to be done virtually, which presented two major problems. First, the town council had to purchase a computer and get Wi-Fi, neither of which are readily available in Pennsylvania. The second issue was the economic impact, not only of the cost of the laptop and the Wi-Fi, but also the loss of tourism dollars. Sadly, the town of Punxsutawney is not expected to financially recover from the loss and is expected to declare bankruptcy as early as tomorrow.

 

 

Smidge,

How old is Phil? How many “Punxsutawney Phil’s” have there been over the years?

Curious in Cape Cod

 

Dear Curious,

This is from the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club’s official website:

There has only been one Punxsutawney Phil. He has been making predictions since 1886! Punxsutawney Phil gets his longevity from drinking the "elixir of life," a secret recipe. Phil takes one sip every summer at the Groundhog Picnic and it magically gives him seven more years of life.

See what I mean? I am serious when I say they are drunk all the time. The “elixir” they are talking about is Rolling Rock beer, brewed right down the road in Latrobe. They are constantly hammered. “Phil” was actually a ferret this year and they didn’t notice. That’s how drunk they are.

 

Well, there you have it, America (and Quebec, wherever that is). You asked and now you know everything there is to know about weather vermin.

We’ll wait this winter nonsense out, whenever it is scheduled to end, and I’ll see you at the big Groundhog Picnic this summer! We’ll all raise a green bottle of “elixir” to Phil. Who knows? He might even be a groundhog again by then.

See you soon,

-Smidge

 

Copyright © 2021 Marc Schmatjen

 

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