This week, an incident so scandalous as to put Bill and Monica to shame sent shock waves through the Midwest. Two cruise ships filled with Minnesota Vikings players, their friends and some “hired help” set out on Lake Minnetonka only to return 90 minutes later. Apparently the players engaged in a plethora of sexual activities not behind closed doors, but out in the open for cruise workers to witness. The cruise employees were so traumatized the captains decided to turn around and report the entire nightmare. I got a chuckle out of the story. While it’s definitely a serious matter this all happened in Minnesota. This is a state that maintains its progressive attitude yet still viscously hangs on to its wholesome façade. This is a tough balancing act and for this most part it does pretty well. After all, the state produced both Prince and Garrison Keillor. Oh yeah, and just about everybody worships the Minnesota Vikings. So what should these deities be allowed to get away with?
I was talking about this (currently the only) local story with my mom on the phone last night. After we exchanged what we had heard and opinions, she changed the topic.
“Have you updated your blog recently?”
“No, I’ve been too busy. Plus, I haven’t had much to say. I started writing something up about what happened at book group this week.”
“What happened at book group?”
I joined my book group a little over a year ago because I thought it would be a good way to meet new (non-physicist) people. The only local group I found met once a month at Borders and consisted of about 10 Jewish women, all retired school teachers. There is also one middle-aged Cuban woman and one middle-aged man. And now me, a timid, rather inarticulate younger woman whom they warmly welcomed. Not exactly a wild bunch. Anyway, for years they met at a large table reserved for them in the middle of Borders with a free carafe of decaf coffee. A few months ago we were rudely moved to the back corner between the W-Z fiction and the window. Our table was gone, but we still got the coffee. Then Tuesday evening our group leader informed us that we were being moved indefinitely to the café section. The manager had told her that the group was “a distraction to shoppers.” It was aweful. Between the coffee grinding and the background conversations nobody could hear anything. One person would say something and everyone just shouted “What?! I can’t hear you!” Anyway, we spend most of the time that we should have been talking about The Good Earth brainstorming instead about where we could meet from now on. Who will take such a rogue group? Do readers really carry a stigma of distraction?
My mother’s reaction to this injustice was priceless.
“Good Lord! So you mean to tell me that if you are a player for the Minnesota Vikings you can take a cruise, get a blowjob and stick sex toys up a hookers ass, but a regular citizen can not meet publicly to discuss a book?! What is society coming to?!”
Indeed.
After I recovered from a fit of uncontrollable laughter I said, “Now THAT makes for an interesting post to my blog!”
Then she said, “Okay. But can you please replace “blowjob” with oral sex and that other thing I said with anal sex?”
Sorry Mom.
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7 comments:
Completely laughing out loud at this posting! Partially because I totally see your mom saying that and then realizing what she said and not wanting to be quoted word-for-word. Hilarious.
You are right. The Vikings story has been the lead on every newscast since Kare 11 (of all stations) broke the story on there 10:00 news on Tuesday. It is actually quite entertaining to see the newscasters, newspapers and talk radio deal with the topic and still maintain the standards that must be held when talking publicly about something of such a delicate nature. Although, the jokes are hilarious.
That is awful that Borders was rude to you. If they have any business sense at all, you'd think they would realize that you spend money when you are at the bookstore. If you don't give you the space, you aren't going to spend money. How stupid! Screw 'em - I hope you find a nice place to meet and buy all your books at Barnes and Noble or some other great little nook of a book store.
Thanks for the great laugh today.
Great, funny blog! The really sad thing is the nasty Vikings will probably get their multi-million dollar stadium and the well behaved(I'm assuming) book group will not even get their table back!
The Vikings story was on O'Reilly the other night. Congratulations, your team made national headlines, without Randy Moss.
I'm not sure what is up with Borders Bookstore. I organized a writers group, and through a similar process we chose a coffee shop not named Starbucks that had lots of room. Find yourself a similar place with couches and tables. Of course they want you to buy something, but really they didn't care much.
Your mom's point is well-taken and would have lost much if watered down. She's dead-on.
dancingo4-
I thought you'd think that was pretty funny. Dean and I bypassed our usual Friday night Borders browsing (I know, what an exciting couple!) in favor of Barnes and Noble. I have always preferred B&N, but the Borders is much closer. Friday though I didn't care. I didn't want to give Borders our business. Unfortunately since Florida isn't as literate as other parts of the country, little "book nooks" are few and far between.
lefty_grrrl-
We do have plenty of Starbucks around here. Again, I'm a little worried about the background noise, but Starbucks is notorious for letting people buy a $2 cup of coffee and not caring if they stay for 2 hours after that. The other issue is that we used to order our books discounted at Borders (again, going back to what the hell business sense does it make for them to be rude to us?). I don't think there will be any sex toys. My tattoo was the big scandal among the retirees this week!
sylvia-
Exceellent point. The irony of that inevitability was not lost on us when we were talking about that.
Scott-
Shame on you! The only reason people should ever watch The O'Reilly Factor is if they have a bottle of booze and think it would be fun to take a shot whenever O'Reilly condemns the liberals. In all seriousness, the loss of Randy has shed light on what those boys got away with when Moss was in the spotlight all the time. As Mike Lupica said this morning, this incident makes Mr. Moss look like Mr. Rogers!
Independent coffee shops (bookstores, restaurants, etc)are rare down here. It's one of the things I can't stand about Florida. It's looking like we're going to settle for a local library where one of the group members is head librarian. When the group started the mediator, a professor at the local community college, wanted everyone to donate $3 a month to a local charity in lieu of her payment. From now on the $3 can go to the library. Still a worthy cause.
minnesotablue-
In case you were worried, I did ask permission before I recounted the story. I thought it would be underhanded of me not to. And Scott's right, it would have lost something if it were watered down. My mom's tendency to say what she thinks is something I truly admire about her. Good to have you back!
I have a boat, why doesn't this ever happen to me?
Thats awesome! I love your mother's comment...it sounds hysterically like something I would say!
minnesotablue, you're a closet poet!!
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