Brring, brring. Who is it? Nature.

Last night the dog mauled a toad in my backyard, and I'm fairly sure it's because she spent a collarless week on an island hunting rodents and she's still in feral mode.



The roll call of animals and birds I saw in Northern Wisconsin this year was impressive, and happily included no bears:
Our Nation's Bald Eagle
white-tailed deer (the state animal, if you really wanted to know)
hawks
least sand piper
mink
loon
painted turtle
mice, mice and more mice (some alive, some not)

Alas, the weasels were elusive this year, most likely because every time I looked for them, I had a noisy black dog running or swimming after me who scared them away.

Next year: Lumberjack Bowl. Only 53 miles away!

"Wisconsin Against the World"

Some of you probably know perfectly well what this teaser in this morning's New York Times refers to. I did not.¹ As it turns out, Wisconsin's college basketball team has a lot of in-state players, and the team they're playing in tonight's NCAA game, Davidson,² has more national and international players.

The Times goes on to say, "[t]hat Wisconsin’s team is more homegrown than its cheese is no accident," which leads me to believe that the folks at the New York Times have no idea how cheese is produced.

Anyway, I was curious where the 11 Wisconsinites on the UW team are from, so I found out:
Milwaukee (3)
Madison (2)
Glendale
Verona
Oshkosh
Appleton
Randolph
Wisconsin Dells

I have to be honest here, I was really hoping for some Osseo, Wauwatosa, Peshtigo, Minong or Jim Falls-style representation.

Anyway, I'd also just like to point out that as I write this, students from Middlebury College are teaching Amherst students how to play Quidditch on the main quad,³ which is I guess what happens at Division III schools.


¹ As has been made clear in these pages before, I don't really give a crap about sports.
² A school I'd barely even heard of, but now I know an awful lot about their dirty laundry.
³ Yes, it is a made-up sport from the Harry Potter novels that involves flying, so I'm not really sure how they're going about it.

"We brought casseroles"

I recently saw the indie flick Lars and the Real Girl, presumably playing at a theater near you. By paying careful attention to license plates and a map posted on the protagonists' cubicle, I was able to discern that the movie is set in a small town in Wisconsin, although the Internet Movie Database informs me that it was actually shot in Ontario. No matter. I was pleased to see a movie portraying Wisconsinites (and rural Wisconsinites at that) as exceedingly thoughtful, considerate people, and not just buffoons with the silly-Midwestern-accented, hideous-sweater-wearing, mayonnaise-eating rap they are often given in the media. Although these characteristics do find their way into the movie, they are counteracted by the overarching portrayal of the townspeople, who -- and humor me as I toss a little medieval Spanish literature your way -- , like Fuenteovejuna in Lope de Vega's play of the same name, become a single, pivotal voice as the film progresses.

I'm not from this rural Wisconsin, but I've spent my share of time among these folks -- hell, I'm related to a few of them -- and I think in general they get a bad rap on big and small screens: Wisconsin stands for bored, bong-hitting teenagers in "That '70s Show;" for eccentric farmers who drive tractors instead of cars in "The Straight Story;" for a state that purports Rodney Dangerfield as a pot-bellied high diver in "Back to School." Lars and the Real Girl may not hit any greater truths than any of these shows or movies, but at least rural Wisconsin is not held up to a lower standard of ridicule than any other Midwestern state in the film.

But, it is true, casseroles are ubiquitous in Wisconsin. (Many involve jello.)

The SJB Returns, and blueberries

AMHERST, MASS. -- I realize that my blog readership has probably dwindled down to a select few after my long absence, but here it is, the middle of August, and since I last set foot in the blogosphere, I've been to Ireland, moved to Massachusetts, driven to Brooklyn and back in a day (not recommended), and bought a hybrid car. I have arrived!

More updates to follow now that I'm wired for action. For now, however, I will placate you with this photo of wild blueberries from the forests of Northern Wisconsin. Visitors to my new faculty housing estate in Amherst may be offered handpicked wild Wisconsin blueberries from the stash in my freezer. Tempted?

Sharp Dressed Double Vision

OSHKOSH, WISC. -- Last week's Fountains of Wayne concert at the Oshkosh Waterfest (This week's featured performer? Three Dog Night! Next week? Grand Funk Railroad!) could have been a real half-assed affair to a crowd of unappreciative townfolk. But, instead, it was a rockin' show on a balmy summer evening with $3 beer and many, many Oshkosh locals who knew all the words to more than just "Stacey's Mom."

ed002d usually provides a set list for his concert reviews, and, in that spirit, here are a smattering of the songs that FoW incorporated into the performance of one of their early hits, "Radiation Wave:" For 10 minutes, the group tossed off a half dozen snippets of classic rock, segueing into the next catchy tune before getting to the chorus, which was just about the time my brother and I (mostly my brother, who's nothing if not a repository of rock) were able to identify the hit. So something by Kansas morphed into ZZ Top's "Sharp Dressed Man," which turned into "Double Vision" by Foreigner, which hit the riff from Eric Clapton's "Layla," which ran into "Jungle Love" by the Steve Miller Band. It was like playing the music portion of the Albatross Pub Quiz! Good stuff.

Don't budge at the bubbler!

There's a great discussion going on over at dloo4d's blog about regionalisms, something that, if you hadn't noticed, is another point of interest here at the SJBlog.
The discussion began over the use of the term "grundy" for "wedgie" in Wisconsin. Other Wisconsin-specific terms include "time machine" for "ATM" (because the company that owns these particular ATMs is the "Tyme" corporation -- dloo4d did the research on this), "budge" for "bud" (as in: "Hey! You budged! Get to the back of the line!") and "bubbler" for "drinking fountain." This last one seems to be a holdover from my Mom's era, because I don't remember ever calling a drinking fountain a bubbler growing up, whereas I have used all the other terms in this list.

The classic regionalism, of course, is not specific to Wisconsin, but in usage all over the Midwest: "pop" for "soda" or "soda pop" or "Coke," depending on where you're from. While I may have dropped or lost my other regionalisms (and, frankly, how often do I talk about grundies?), ever since that first person in college said "Pop?!? Don't you mean soda???" I have hung on to pop with pride. You can't take pop away from me, do you hear me???

Things I Can Do in Madison...

... that I can't do in Berkeley:

• Laundry! Without leaving the house, and as often as I want!
• Watch cable, both the vapid (endless E! celebrity year-in-reviews) and the witty (The Daily Show!).
  
• Celebrate the recent success of my 2-year-old nephew in "putting a poopy in the potty!"
• Theoretically: play in the snow. Actually: hope it drops below 32 degrees for Xmas because I can suffer through holiday rain in California, thank you very much.
• Drive a 2003 Volkswagon Passat! (ahem, theoretically...Dad...)
• Trade in my laptop and uncalloused hands to tromp off through a farm and saw down a tree (long time watcher, first time sawer) to a chorus of "timber!" Gratifying? You betcha!
• And, of course, say things like "pop," "you betcha" and "ya, sure, hey" without fear of ridicule. Instead, I get ridiculed for using "fortuitous" wrong or mentioning that in California it sometimes hits 70s degrees in December. Can't win.