MR WRONG: You ain't nothin' but a groundhog
Indignity Vol. 6, No. 8
BUT WAIT, THERE'S ALREADY MORE DEP'T.
Tom Scocca
Before the next chapter drops tomorrow, take a trip down THE STAIRS, Tom Scocca's serialized work of fiction!
COLUMN DEP’T.
MR WRONG: Groundhog Day Is an Occasion for Reverence
GROUNDHOG DAY APPROACHES! Do you like Groundhog Day? Marmota monax! It is one of my favorite holidays, and not just because it is one of the most dependable recurring crutches for leveraging into a column! I prefer to spend my Groundhog Day in reflection, enjoying snacks and contemplating the noble and humble Groundhog, secure in its Winter redoubt, deep in the slumbering earth, half-dreaming about the coming of Spring. Renewal is nigh! Groundhog Day!
The Editors
Unfortunately, a big part of Groundhog Day is that once a year people go all cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs and start handling and otherwise exploiting animals in order to draw attention to themselves. Groundhog Day!
Joe MacLeod
I love Groundhog Day, but, I mean, yeah, c’mon, let’s look at a fucking calendar, for fuck’s sake, Feb. 2 is a pretty good day to be hunkered down inside your castle consoling yourself with the fact that Spring is coming in about six weeks. It’s right there in numbers on the calendar! We don’t need to sweat some poor ground-dweller for the intel!
Joe MacLeod
Anyway, allow me to regurge myself from a previous episode of the Mr. Wrong column:
I Googled “how many days until spring” and went to a web site called howmanydaysuntil.center, where I was greeted by a picture of the famous Groundhog Day movie actor Bill Murray with a groundhog, and I found a countdown clock that shows spring starts in 45 days, which is about six weeks from now, which is always the answer, right? The Groundhog supposedly “sees its shadow” and then communicates via a secret language that there’s six more weeks of winter, or there’s six weeks until spring. See? We wonder why people believe in a Space Laser that causes forest fires and meanwhile we don’t say a goddamn shit fucking thing when people say they are gonna have a party and ask a Groundhog about meteorology!
The idea that you need to consult a pudgy rodent, who is just minding their own business, to get a forecast is ridiculous and preposterous, and so sure, therein lies the appeal to me: as a shining Idea, an Existential Holiday, seriously, you do not need to actually molest a Groundhog to observe the ritualistic beauty of Groundhog Day. You can just congregate around a representative burrow or dugout or whatever a Groundhog is quartered in, a den, maybe? A dugout? Yes, an earthen dugout, sacristy of the Groundhog! You can construct your own Dugout! Then you may don festive raiment and supplicate to the Groundhog in a manner similar to the way some of the planet’s population communicates with other Deities who know stuff, right? No Groundhog need be present! The spirit of the Groundhog is the Groundhog!
Sample prayer to The Groundhog:
O, mighty Groundhog
WE ask of your infinite wisdom spanning the seasons and the centuries
WE ask from the depths of ignorance and total disconnection with the Natural World
WE entreat your mastery, universe-wise, of the demarcation between the winter of our despair and the sunshine of your love, in terms of when is it going to start getting warm, for reals
WE petition your powerful-toothed power
TURN our unseeing eyes and dim li’l brain-bulbs toward a calendar
SHOW us when is Spring
WE are cold
YOU have fur
Thank you, this concludes our service, don’t forget to splash the collection plate on your way out.
The MR. WRONG COLUMN is a general-interest column appearing weekly. No refunds. Write Wrong: wrongcolumn@gmail.com.
EASY LISTENING DEP'T.
Here is the Indignity Morning Podcast archive!
TOM SCOCCA
SOCIAL SANDWICHES DEP'T.
SANDWICH RECIPES DEP'T.
WE PRESENT INSTRUCTIONS for the assembly of sandwiches selected from Catering for special occasions, with menus & recipes, by Fannie Merrit Farmer, published in 1911 and available at archive.org for the delectation of all.
HONOR SANDWICHES
Cut white bread in one-fourth inch slices, and shape with heart cutter. Spread with pimiento butter, put together in pairs, and arrange on a fancy plate covered with a doiley.
PIMIENTO BUTTER
Cream two tablespoons butter, add one canned pimiento forced through a sieve, and work until thoroughly blended; then season with salt.
If you are inspired to prepare a sandwich inspired by these offerings, be sure to send your thoughts and a picture to indignity@indignity.net.
SELF-SERVING SELF-PROMOTION DEP'T.
