Scott Alarik, Big Sky Mudflaps. Butch Thompson Trio, Cambridge Buskers, Klezmorim,
[undocumented]
Well, sir, it's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, my old hometown. Big news, I guess this last week was that a fellow from Lake Wobegon spent a week out in Los Angeles. Came back to the Chatterbox Cafe. People asked him how he liked it. He said “it was just fine I had a wonderful time.”
They kind of looked at him funny, they said, “but the smog then? How about the smog?”
He said “it was clear and sunny, sky was blue last Saturday I didn't notice it.”
They said “but the people, the people were kind of shallow, weren't they sort of glamorous and not too bright?”
He said “no.” He said “people there just like people anywhere. The ones I met were just fine.”
They weren't too pleased by that information. They decided that his head had been turned that he would bear careful scrutiny in the future. Someone started a rumor about him that there was a long V-shaped sun tan down his chest. With one white spot in the middle where the gold medallion had been. Somebody said he'd gone into the Chatterbox Café- ordered papaya juice.
Of course, it's not true. Not a word of it. I don't think it had anything to do with that, but Evelyn down to the Sidetrack Tap took the big blinds off the front windows of the tavern here on Wednesday. This last week said she was just going to take him down, clean him, put him back up, but she never did. That was on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and now Saturday. The blinds have been down in that place, lit up like all outdoors. Poor old guys. The old regulars are going at noon for a bump and a beer, and play a couple hands of pinochle, all had to move into the back booths. Get a little dimness. Sitting back there like a bunch of old barn owls squinting. Sunlight gives them headaches, makes the beer go bad. But beyond that, it's just not right. It just isn't the way a tavern is supposed to be in Lake Wobegon, Minnesota.
Evelyn, she's talking about tearing out the wallboard down to the bare brick, painting the ceiling, putting in some plants, taking out the pool table, putting in a salad bar like she's seen once in Minneapolis. Pretty soon those old boys going to be down in the basement.
Mr Thorvaldson here on Friday night ordered a Boilermaker. She came round with something in a glass with ice in it. She said “here. Try this, you'll like it.”
He took a sip of it. He about gagged. It was whiskey with lemon juice in it and a slice of orange floating in it. Fruit juice in the whiskey!
He said “good, gosh Evelyn, why don't you just put flies in it? Put mosquitoes in it. Why don't you just put a shot of arsenic in it? Get it over with.”
Well, there's not much Wally can do, the bar is in Evelyn name. It was her dad’s bar. Wally says “hold on for a couple weeks. She's going to go visit her sister in Omaha. We'll get things back to normal.”
Visiting from Chicago this last week was Father Emil’s nephew Father Todd. Fine looking young man who just had his picture in Parish Parade magazine. For his ministry at the race tracks in Chicago where he's known as the Parimutuel Padre. Came up on Monday, but you know he's not the formal dresser that Father Emil is, so people didn't know for a while that he was a man of the cloth. They just thought he was Father Emil’s nephew out there collecting a suntan out in the lawn behind the rectory.
Of course, when they found out he was a priest, that changed everything. In Lake Wobegon, as in many places, people don't converse with priests as they converse with other people. They converse by asking Father a question about a certain topic. Don't you think, Father, that so and so and such and such you know, a nd the answer is always supposed to be yes, of course you're right about that. But Father Todd came out with some rather surprising answers. Made people remember that they'd left a tea kettle on someplace, had to go someplace fast.
He is going to leave on Sunday. And he is going to assist Father Emil with mass on Sunday morning, and I imagine the attendance is going ho be high. Because Mrs. Krebsbach reported on authority from Mrs. Deener, who had heard it from the Sisterhood that Father Todd intends to assist at mass wearing the t-shirt that he was wearing on Wednesday that said “kiss me. I'm a Christian” on the front of it. And of course, it can't be true. But on the other hand, if it were you'd want to be there to see it, wouldn't you?
It was a good week for rumors in Lake Wobegon. There was a story that Harold Star was going to sell the newspaper to a bunch of former Wobegonioans who were going to use it to settle up some old scores in town. Print a lot of stuff that wasn't true. As one of the people who was mentioned as a buyer, I can say it's not true this story- no intention. Somebody said that Pastor Inkvist when he dropped off his trash at the dump on Monday, dumped off a whole bunch of real trashy magazines along with his cans and the coffee grounds. Someone said “what kind of magazines”, someone said “Well, you know I'm not about to mention, you know what I'm talking about.”
Well, of course it's not true. Bud in Lake Wobegon fiction is appreciated, discussed and analyzed as much as in any English department. And while it's not a good thing to do damage to someone’s reputation, all of us would like to be considered capable of sin or at least interested.
It's like Miss Falconer when the story went around about her that she was keeping time with a violinist on weekends at the Curtis Hotel in Minneapolis. Her stock went way up among all her students. All the choir members. Of course it wasn't true, but it was an interesting story. When I passed it on, I made him a jazz violinist. I moved him to the Sheraton Ritz.
Of course, it's not true. I knew it wasn't true. But if there's one thing worse than telling lies about someone, it's ignoring them and taking them for granted. I've been trying to get a story going now all this last week. That Robert Redford attended all three of our shows in Los Angeles and offered us $100,000 for film rights with the part of yours truly to be played by you know who. But people haven't cooperated. The story came back to me today and the offer was down to $50,000 and it was Walter Matthau. Pretty soon I'll be right back where I started, huh? Back in Lake Wobegon. Back working for Herald Star writing Whippet stories and other obituaries for $30 a week.
Well, that's all right. I can always go back there, you know. Some people think I made that town up. And I might have made up some things. But there's one thing I know, and that's the town where all the women are strong and all the men are good looking and all the children are above average. Lake Wobegon Minnesota. I'll see it sooner than I know.
1982.05.23 La Crosse Tribune / 1982.06.19 Louisville Courier / 1982.06.19 Wisconsin State Journal / Audio of the News available as a digital download.