Philip Brunelle, Vern Sutton,
Teddy Bear's Picnic ( Vern Sutton , Philip Brunelle )
[undocumented]
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Well, sir, it's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon, Minnesota. Not a whole lot of news to report. The newts are down in Florida. Just arrived there here this last week. They drove this time so they could carry more stuff with them, the rock collection and the rock polisher and a number of back issues of stitch magazine, on account of the pattern for the sweater was printed in installments.
They were a little bit nervous about driving down there, on account of Chicago and its freeway system, which is so complicated they have freeways. They're going around Chicago, six lanes in one direction, and you're driving along, and suddenly three lanes veer off, and you find yourself part of a formation that's going to Rockford. But they spent the night just outside of Chicago and got up at one o'clock in the morning, and they snuck on through the lines with only an occasional semi to worry about. And the first postcards arrived back here this last week, and they're both in the pink and having a fine time.
The Valentine's Day dance is tonight in the town hall in Lake Wobegon, and the sponsors, the steering committee was a little bit concerned, because only three couples had signed up by yesterday afternoon, and Ralph was a little put out because he'd broiled up a lot of chicken for it, and Ole Nordquist and his ole Polka orchestra was in a dither. So let's get out there tonight to the town hall for the Valentine's Day dance sponsored by the sweethearts club at Lake Wobegon Lutheran Church. Some you couples there, it wouldn't hurt you to go out and have a good time. Father. Emil, is in St Paul here for a few weeks. He is staying with his niece over on the east side, and is lobbying up at the state legislature for a constitutional amendment on abortion. You probably know which side of that he falls.
He's made his position clear enough over the years, up at Our Lady of Perpetual responsibility church father, IMO, believes there should be no such thing as an unwanted child, that if people do not want children or a child wouldn't at least be kind of an interesting surprise that they they should abstain, is how he feels about it. Father, Emil says, If you don't want to go to Chicago, why get on the train?
So he's up at the legislature, and people who've seen him up there say that he hasn't talked to anybody, that he just sits up in the visitors gallery and kind of waits for somebody to come up and ask him what he has in his briefcase so he can pull out his pamphlets. It's hard to think of his tongue being tied, but all of that marble up there probably has a way of spooking people, even father emo and then too, he whenever he comes to the cities, he feels that he talks funny.
It's odd that people who have a little French or a little British accent, you know, other people practically fall all over themselves to hear them and to do things for them that's considered quite stylish, but somebody who has a has a little Deutsch in their voice why they made to feel embarrassed for it. So I just hope that if there are any legislators who are listening, they'll look him up. He's up in the visitors gallery. You can't miss him. He wears his collar and he has a big briefcase. And just ask him what he has in his briefcase so he can show you and go back to Lake Wobegon, where they need him more.
There was a baby born this last week, and one on its way this coming week, and they both need to be baptized, and the roof is leaking at the rectory, and they need to know whether to patch it or just to put out the pans and wait until spring and to re roof. There's a girl in the fourth grade who's lost her faith now four times in the last two weeks. So they need him at home. They need him at home. And Lake Wobegon can't think of much else. The Town Council is meeting on Tuesday to. To take up the proposal for a new bridge that they need, the bridge that crosses the ravine and carries the gravel road back to arts Bates night arrest motel, art and his few guests, and then the Gunderson's next door and their few friends are the only people who would use that bridge. The old one has fallen down, a new one had cost $80,000 so it should be an interesting meeting.
Somebody has proposed just having the gravel road go right on through with a big dip in it. Other people think that a rope swing might be good enough. So that's on Tuesday night. And I hesitate to mention this last item, but I but I do, because there have been so many rumors about it in Lake Wobegon, and there have been rumors that Ralph has gone out and bought himself a snowmobile, which caused consternation among all the skiers and cross country skiers in Lake Wobegon. Ralph, of course, kind of the father of cross country skiing up there the host of the pretty long marathon every year. And of course, the snowmobilers and the cross country skiers, those are two distinct and separate groups. I mean, there are no joint memberships, but the truth is that Ralph bought the snowmobile to groom trails, to groom trails for cross country skiing. It was not bought for fun. It was bought to groom trails.
And that's true. There are now, after since he's gotten the snowmobile, miles and miles of trails and Lake Wobegon, some of them a little bit hard to use for skiers, the sharp S curves and figure eights, and some of them run in the ditch where it's not safe for skiers to go on account of the heavy snowmobile traffic. But he bought it to groom trails. So remember that. That's the news from Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, where all the women are strong and all the children are above average, and all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average, and all the women are strong and and a lot more than that, besides Lake.
1980.02.09 La Crosse Tribune / Audio of the News available as a digital download.