I returned to Minnesota on Friday for a much needed vacation from college. Although the drive from Indiana to Minnesota is 620 miles, the trip wasn’t bad. I gave my other [ fraternal ] little brother, Will, a ride back to Minnesota, so I had some company in the car. After getting home, I relaxed for a couple hours before I got in contact with one of my high school buddies, Eric. The plan was originally to see the new James Bond flick, “Die Another Day.” Instead, Eric mentioned that he was flying to Chicago the next day and offered to let me ride along. Not having been to Chicago for many years, I accepted the offer. (Why was Eric flying to Chicago? He needed to fly to Chicago as a component of his efforts to get instrument-rated) Soon after, I drove down to Mankato to be near the plane for the early-morning departure. At 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, Eric, Eric’s flight instructor, one of Eric’s other friends, and myself took off in a Cessna Skylane 182 from the Waseca airport. Destination, Chicago’s Meigs Field.

We had a good tailwind on the way to Meigs, which, combined with the high-performance nature of the Skylane, gave us a ground speed of about 160 mph. After making several touch-and-gos en route, we arrived at Meigs. The weather was beautiful: Sunny skies with a hint of haze. The winds were a bit high but nothing that the pilots and plane couldn’t handle. Meigs Field was wonderful. The view of the Chicago skyline was wonderful, and made for a great photo backdrop. We stayed at Meigs just long enough to refuel before turning around and heading back to Minnesota. Unfortunately, the tailwind that aided our journey to Illinois hindered our trek home. Our ground speed rarely exceeded 100 mph on the way back. Eventually, I got back to Minnesota and drove home. Time for rest? Hardly.

I was home for no more than ten minutes before my sister and I left to go to a Gophers Men’s Hockey game. I hadn’t been to a Gophers hockey game in many years and had never attended one at the relatively new Mariucci Arena. The atmosphere was festive inside the arena. Everywhere we looked, Gophers jerseys filled the stands. Fans of the opposing team, Michigan Tech, were consumed by the native masses of maroon and gold. The Gophers mascot, Goldy, was warming up the crowd with crazy antics. Once the game got underway, the student sections livened up with traditional cheers and taunts. There was plenty of goalie heckling going on, what with cheers of “Ellsworth is a great big sieve, do-dah, do-dah . . . ” (of course, Ellsworth was the Michigan Tech goalie). As another example, whenever a Minnesota penalty expired, the public address announcer, Jamie, would proclaim, “Gophers are full strength.” The fans then replied, “We always were!” At the beginning and end of each period, as well as after every Gophers goal, everybody in the arena stood up and sang/clapped the University of Minnesota rouser. All of the cheers are quite detailed and well orchestrated. Everybody reading this should go to a Gophers game to see what I’m talking about. If you do go, be sure to check the cheer reference so that you know what to say.

The game was good. We ended up winning 2 – 1. I returned home with my sister, and went directly to sleep. So how far did I travel? Between 6:00 a.m. on Friday and 10:00 p.m. on Saturday, I went: 620 miles from Indiana to Minnesota; 90 miles from home to Mankato; 460 miles from Mankato to Chicago; 460 miles from Chicago to Mankato; 90 miles from Mankato to home; and 40 miles from home to Mariucci and back again. That makes for 1760 miles in 40 hours, or an average speed of 44 mph.

I’ll try to slow down in the next week.

Last week dragged on a bit too long (between 6:20 a.m. Monday and 1:00 a.m. Thursday I got seven hours of sleep). Granted, most of the pressure came from procrastination on a major Digital Systems project (oops), but the non-stop barrage of 10th-week loose ends didn’t help things either.

So, in an effort to relax away from the pressures of school, I decided to grab a bite to eat with my new [fraternal] little brother, Vince. I thought that at one point I had overheard Kiefer mention a place called Pino’s under the context that it was a deli. I like delis, and Vince had no objection, so we proceeded on our merry way.

We arrived in the parking lot, opened the door, and immediately knew something was amiss. Everyone in the restaurant was dressed nicely. There was a live person playing soft music on a grand piano in the corner. Each place setting had multiple forks and a bread plate.

It turns out that Pino’s Il Sonetto is most definitely not a deli; in fact, it is one of the nicest restaurants in Terre Haute. I wanted to take Vince to a place a bit nicer than the usual Rose-Hulman ARA, but man, I really overshot the mark.

Surprisingly, even though we walked in waaaay underdressed (think jeans and t-shirt), they still served us. I looked at the menu and didn’t recognize anything. All of the entries had fancy Italian names, and even the English descriptions did little to apprise me of the culinary content. I sat befuddled for a moment before I ordered something that I think was made with chicken using a corrupt, anglicized pronunciation of the fine Italian name.

A short while later, I received my meal. I think it was some sort of chicken breast stuffed with Parmesan cheese, covered with some interpretation of tomato sauce. Whatever it was, it tasted good. That’s the important part, right? Vince went with the rib-eye steak, which I guess was very good as well. All the time while eating, we did our best to avoid committing a fine dining faux pas. For the most part, I think we were successful, but then again, we were already so out of place that I don’t think anybody would have noticed had we used the wrong fork or forgotten about the bread plate.

At the end, the bill confirmed yet again that we were not in a deli. Ah well. Now, if I find occasion to impress somebody with a fine restaurant, I will think of Pino’s Il Sonetto.

I’ve been quite busy with school and other activities as of late, but last weekend I found time to go to my Fraternity’s Halloween party. It’s been a running joke for the past year that I would go to this year’s party in costume as my roommate from last year, Scott “Minufo” Mollan.

And so, I did.

Two of my Brothers joined me, so we had a total of three fake Minufos and one real one. We followed all of the key visual cues: Plaid flannel pyjama pants, “boat shoes” without socks, red Fast Track t-shirt, glasses, and red chaotic hair. Of course, the costume wouldn’t be complete without an aural impersonation, so we added that too. You might be interested in seeing a photo or two of us. Can you guess which one is the real Minufo?

Our costumes seemed to go over well at the party, although nobody “got” the joke except for Brothers. That said, I had a fun time doing it. Now what will I be next year…

Many years ago, as a child, I asked my cousins to play “Duck Duck Gray Duck.” Instead of forming a circle and smiling with glee, they stared at me as if I had just asked them to play Gazordinplat (*see below). Imagine my shock when I found out that they all played “Duck Duck Goose” instead of the obviously correct “Duck Duck Gray Duck!”

Years later, when the topic came up again, I surmised that only Minnesotans play “Duck Duck Gray Duck,” whereas the other 49 states play “Duck Duck Goose.” Even the 51st state, Canada (eh?), plays the Goose corruption.

Now that I live most of the year in Indiana, I often need to defend the Gray Duck tradition against Goose insurgents. Unlike the great soda vs. pop debate, Minnesotans fight a lonely battle on the Gray Duck – Goose battlefield. Fortunately, all true Gopher-state natives will vehemently oppose any uprising against this polarizing game. Encounters between Minnesota zealots and ‘those other guys’ can turn messy, as more than one cafeteria food melee has shown. I hypothesize that the source of the rift can be traced back to the childhood story, “The Ugly Duckling.”

In “The Ugly Duckling,” a gray duckling finds itself in a duck’s nest, surrounded by yellow ducklings. The gray duckling is an outcast, even more so as the yellow ducklings develop into mature ducks. Eventually, the gray duckling discovers it isn’t a duck at all – rather, it is a swan. The swan is more refined than any of the ducks, and the story ends with a moral about not judging people by their looks.

Based on “The Ugly Duckling,” the gray duck is the oddball amongst yellow ducks. Hence, it would make sense to drop the ‘yellow’ moniker and call the true ducks, ducks. Therefore, we have a bunch of ducks and a single gray duck. Duck, duck, gray duck! Then where did goose come from? The rest of the world no doubt saw a picture of the gray duck when it grew up. Instead of recognizing the mature gray duck as a swan, the duck-duck-goose founders saw a goose. At which point, one of the founders, being from ‘down south,’ pulled his 12-gauge from the rack in the truck and blew a hole through the photograph. Well, maybe not the gun part. Unlikely scenario? Think you know your geese? Pop quiz: Which is correct: Candian Geese or Canada Geese? Yep, the latter is the proper version. This is not to imply that those playing duck-duck-goose think of the goose as a Canada Goose. In fact, the above factoid has nothing at all to do with my primary argument: that duck-duck-goose is just plain wrong. Unfortunately, the rest of the world seems not to agree.

So why doesn’t Minnesota change? We’re very zealous about our Minnesota-ness. Minnesotans, in general:

• Play duck-duck-gray-duck
• Drink pop
• Let slip an occasional, ‘ya know’
• Consider a foot of snow a light dusting
• Eat (or at least know of) bars, hot dish, and lutefisk
• Enjoy talking about Minnesota
• Go for vacations ‘up north’
• Consider 5 F ‘a bit cool’ and 85 F ‘really hot’
• Make fun of Iowa
• Respond to “Thanks!” with “You bet!”
• Know that the Vikings are always better than the Packers

After all, we have a book called “How to Talk Minnesotan.” Does your state? That’s what I thought.

So, Minnesotans, unite! Proclaim it often, proclaim it loud: Duck, Duck….. Gray Duck!

* For those of you scratching your heads, ‘gazordinplat’ is a made up word finding its roots in a “Garfield and Friends” cartoon episode. This page marks its first (and only) appearance on the World Wide Web

That’s right – it’s been exactly one month since my previous post. I’m still extremely busy, so here’s a quick update. I built a recessed bookcase. Classes started today; they are going well. Work is going well, and though I am finished working full time, I continue to put in a few hours per week. Rush starts next week. Too much to do!