...but it's obvious that my wife will not garner enough votes to be sent to the North Pole. Meaning she will remain with me during the week when she'd otherwise be at the North Pole.
Oh well. This blog ends here, but I've started another one while looking for new contests that will send my wife somewhere.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Call Him Andrée Not-the-Giant
We're in the home stretch of trying to send my wife to the North Pole, and I'd like to tell you about a few guys who tried to reach the North Pole and failed quite miserably.
By "quite miserably" I mean they ended up "quite dead."
Just by the Wikipedia title, S. A. Andrée's Arctic Balloon Expedition of 1897, you know things probably weren't going to turn out very well.
The details of this disaster present a situation not much different than if you and your friends were sitting on the couch on day and agreed, after several beers, to "hey let's all go to the North Pole!"
A mere year after Alfred Nobel died, leaving in his will the foundation for what would become the Nobel Prizes, fellow Swede S. A. Andrée set himself up as a finalist for a Darwin Award.
Here are a few things that worked against Andrée:
Somehow, he convinced a couple of fellows to join him, and with an optimism that wouldn't be seen for another 15 years, when someone would reply, "The Titantic is the safest ship in any ocean!," the trio set off, amid chants of the Swedish version of "Huzzah!"
Then, a mere two days later, this:
Their whereabouts were unknown until 1930, and not because they were in hiding. The bodies of the three explorers were discovered by accident on the island of Kvitøya, part of the Svalbard archipelago owned by Norway.
It would be generous to say that Andrée's legacy is rather mixed. A further insult occurred when a monument, built in 1997 to commemorate the 100-year anniversary of the trip (though I'm not sure why you'd want to remember the voyage, other than as a warning against bad planning) "was later deliberately destroyed by the Svalbard authority, on the ground of its being illegally erected."
Yeesh. I think the only balloons related to the North Pole contest that my wife is entering will be the ones in my house for the party I'll be having to celebrate her going to the North Pole for two weeks.
Please vote for her — don't let the air out of my balloon!
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
By "quite miserably" I mean they ended up "quite dead."
Just by the Wikipedia title, S. A. Andrée's Arctic Balloon Expedition of 1897, you know things probably weren't going to turn out very well.
The details of this disaster present a situation not much different than if you and your friends were sitting on the couch on day and agreed, after several beers, to "hey let's all go to the North Pole!"
A mere year after Alfred Nobel died, leaving in his will the foundation for what would become the Nobel Prizes, fellow Swede S. A. Andrée set himself up as a finalist for a Darwin Award.
Here are a few things that worked against Andrée:
- His method of steering the balloon was unlikely to work
- The balloon had never been tested
- Final measurements proved that the balloon was leaking
Somehow, he convinced a couple of fellows to join him, and with an optimism that wouldn't be seen for another 15 years, when someone would reply, "The Titantic is the safest ship in any ocean!," the trio set off, amid chants of the Swedish version of "Huzzah!"
Then, a mere two days later, this:
Oh, jävlar.
Their whereabouts were unknown until 1930, and not because they were in hiding. The bodies of the three explorers were discovered by accident on the island of Kvitøya, part of the Svalbard archipelago owned by Norway.
It would be generous to say that Andrée's legacy is rather mixed. A further insult occurred when a monument, built in 1997 to commemorate the 100-year anniversary of the trip (though I'm not sure why you'd want to remember the voyage, other than as a warning against bad planning) "was later deliberately destroyed by the Svalbard authority, on the ground of its being illegally erected."
Yeesh. I think the only balloons related to the North Pole contest that my wife is entering will be the ones in my house for the party I'll be having to celebrate her going to the North Pole for two weeks.
Please vote for her — don't let the air out of my balloon!
* * *
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Well, I'd Say SOMETHING Is Hollow Here
There are some people who would think it's in my wife's best interest NOT to be sent to the North Pole because she might fall in a giant hole that leads to the center of the earth. I hope you are not among them.
If you're a Hollow Earther, then you either haven't read or you reject as hogwash what Wikipedia calls "overwhelming observational evidence [such as, like, gravity], as well as [...] the modern understanding of planet formation" and the fact that "the scientific community has dismissed the notion since at least the late 18th century."
Or, you're just nuts.
In a world where you can be an ordinary citizen of Kansas who declares the elections of the previous five popes invalid in order to justify calling yourself Pope Michael, surely we'd be able to find someone who still believes in the hollow earth theory:
Yes. The earth is hollow. Of course it is. Skeptical? Well, check out this image from the site:
It all makes sense now. I shouldn't be so sarcastic. Perhaps all those things the website says about our hollow planet is true:
But if it were true, Heaven aside, it sounds like a pretty crowded place to be, what with the Israelites and Vikings and Nazis and aliens and such. If you send Jenn to the North Pole — and you do that by voting for her — I'll have to make sure she avoids stepping into any large holes. There could be polar bears...or plenty of very old men who haven't seen a woman under the age of 150 in a very long time.
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
If you're a Hollow Earther, then you either haven't read or you reject as hogwash what Wikipedia calls "overwhelming observational evidence [such as, like, gravity], as well as [...] the modern understanding of planet formation" and the fact that "the scientific community has dismissed the notion since at least the late 18th century."
Or, you're just nuts.
In a world where you can be an ordinary citizen of Kansas who declares the elections of the previous five popes invalid in order to justify calling yourself Pope Michael, surely we'd be able to find someone who still believes in the hollow earth theory:
It all makes sense now. I shouldn't be so sarcastic. Perhaps all those things the website says about our hollow planet is true:
It is a terrestrial paradise,...where the original Garden of Eden is located today...where the Lost Tribes of Israel live
...where the Political Kingdom of God is located...where the Lost Viking Colonies of Greenland migrated to
...where vanquished Germans migrated to after World War II...where flying saucers come from...where people live to be hundreds of years old in perfect health...where peace and prosperity exists for everyone
...where Heaven is located (the inner sun)
* * *
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
Friday, January 21, 2011
In a North Pole State of Mind; or, Other North Poles, Part 3
Hello! Have you voted to send my wife to the North Pole? Please do so! The North Pole in question is the real North Pole, not the Faux Poles in Alaska or Idaho that I've discussed previously.
I'd like to discuss yet another town that bills itself as "North Pole," which is accurate if you meant north of Albany:
Who knew that Santa was a New Yorker? North Pole, New York, is slightly west of I-87, that stretch of barren nothingness that delivers you from the state capital to Plattsburgh and Canada by plowing through the Adirondack Mountains. We made the trip to Plattsburgh last summer for my wife's brother's wedding, and I can tell you that driving on that part of I-87 is like being in a Hanna-Barbera cartoon with the wraparound background with the same pattern of tree-rock-sign-car looping every 10 seconds.
Consider that North Pole is 25 miles west of I-87, and the fact that driving in the mountains takes about three times longer than if you drove the same distance in the suburbs, and you'll conclude that the New York North Pole is probably more remote than the real North Pole.
It should come as no surprise that the New York North Pole tries to lure tourists with the Santa's Workshop theme. I suppose if the kids buy into the idea, and they're not so precocious that they carry a globe or a compass or a sextant, it beats going to the real deal, unless you're me and there's a chance you can send my wife there.
Lest you think the village was created by cynical modern marketers, it actually pre-dates the Disney parks, having been built in 1949. Do you have anything to add, Wikipedia?
If you go to the official website of North Pole, New York, you'll notice there's not much going on, now that Christmas is over. There is a link on the site for employment but, sadly, it returns a "Sorry, the page you’re looking for can’t be found" page. Looks like hard times for everyone. Maybe the new Governor Cuomo can turn things around.
I also learned from the website that Maurices (no apostrophe), a clothing chain I've never heard of but which looks like a small-town Kohl's, had a little photoshoot at North Pole, and I found a link to a video. I expected to get a better look at the town, but instead I got this:
Would I send my wife to the New York North Pole? Probably not. She'd be bored pretty quickly, and it's only a six-hour drive, so she'd come home pretty quickly. Too quickly. Unless she had to share a room with the model in the video above and then they got snowed in and the heat went out and they had to stay warm by...
...where was I? Oh yeah. So, no New York North Pole for my wife. Send her to the real deal.
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
I'd like to discuss yet another town that bills itself as "North Pole," which is accurate if you meant north of Albany:
Who knew that Santa was a New Yorker? North Pole, New York, is slightly west of I-87, that stretch of barren nothingness that delivers you from the state capital to Plattsburgh and Canada by plowing through the Adirondack Mountains. We made the trip to Plattsburgh last summer for my wife's brother's wedding, and I can tell you that driving on that part of I-87 is like being in a Hanna-Barbera cartoon with the wraparound background with the same pattern of tree-rock-sign-car looping every 10 seconds.
Consider that North Pole is 25 miles west of I-87, and the fact that driving in the mountains takes about three times longer than if you drove the same distance in the suburbs, and you'll conclude that the New York North Pole is probably more remote than the real North Pole.
It should come as no surprise that the New York North Pole tries to lure tourists with the Santa's Workshop theme. I suppose if the kids buy into the idea, and they're not so precocious that they carry a globe or a compass or a sextant, it beats going to the real deal, unless you're me and there's a chance you can send my wife there.
Lest you think the village was created by cynical modern marketers, it actually pre-dates the Disney parks, having been built in 1949. Do you have anything to add, Wikipedia?
Originally built on the road to Whiteface Mountain by a Lake Placid businessman whose daughter had desperately wanted to see Santa's house...I don't mean to cut you off, Wikipedia, but if it were 1949 and my daughter wanted to see Santa's house (if it were this year, I would just fire up a photo of any large house on the Internet and say, "Look! Santa's house!"), I would have made some excuse like:
- "Santa's house is so secret that if you see it, you'll never get any presents."
- "Santa lives way, way at the North Pole, and the Boeing 747 required to make the trip won't be invented for another 20 years."
If you go to the official website of North Pole, New York, you'll notice there's not much going on, now that Christmas is over. There is a link on the site for employment but, sadly, it returns a "Sorry, the page you’re looking for can’t be found" page. Looks like hard times for everyone. Maybe the new Governor Cuomo can turn things around.
I also learned from the website that Maurices (no apostrophe), a clothing chain I've never heard of but which looks like a small-town Kohl's, had a little photoshoot at North Pole, and I found a link to a video. I expected to get a better look at the town, but instead I got this:
Would I send my wife to the New York North Pole? Probably not. She'd be bored pretty quickly, and it's only a six-hour drive, so she'd come home pretty quickly. Too quickly. Unless she had to share a room with the model in the video above and then they got snowed in and the heat went out and they had to stay warm by...
...where was I? Oh yeah. So, no New York North Pole for my wife. Send her to the real deal.
* * *
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
What's Nunavut With You?
Here's what I know about Canada: it has territories, which are like our states only they're called territories, not states. The ones that border our northern border are all around the same height. Above that is an enormous, seemingly unpopulated land mass called "The Northwest Territories," which were apparently so important that no one ever gave them a proper name.
Because I don't follow any news out of Canada except when the Yankees are playing the Blue Jays, I had no idea that these Northwest Territories — which is actually one territory, even though it's plural (that's Canada for you, I suppose) — were split into two territories in 1999.
One territory is still called Northwest Territories (plural), but the other, which runs closest to the North Pole, is called Nunavut.
Okay, you're probably thinking, other than finding an excuse to blog in order to convince me to send your wife to the North Pole, why should I give a Molson Golden about this stretch of Canada?
Well, friend, here's why:
That is the Coat of Arms of Nunavut, and it is the most-badass thing I've seen in a long time. You've got a reindeer and a fucking narwhal holding some sort of crazy shield that has a bowl of chili and a smushed sword of some sort, and on top of the shield is an igloo with a crown and a porch light. Beneath the reindeer and the narwhal — which are both standing up, mind you — there's the most awesome-looking language this side of Klingon.
Clearly, they consulted the territory's most imaginative 12-year-old to create this thing. I want to wear a T-shirt with this coat of arms just to see how long people will stare at it to try to figure out what the hell is going on.
(The language is Inuktitut, the language of the Inuit, by the way. Stop by the official website of the government of Nunavut to download some Inuit fonts, and use them in your business correspondence!)
And the awesomeness doesn't stop there. Who wouldn't want to have this license plate attached to their SUV:
Yes. It's shaped like a polar bear.
Here's the flag:
Not quite as badass. It turns out that that image is not a mashed-up sword or a snowman with a giant sombrero, but an inukshuk, a kind of Inuit marker. Still, it's actually a controversial flag in the eyes of flag-watchers, according to the Wikipedia page:
Anyway, Nunavut is home to the northernmost permanently inhabited place in the world, appropriately called Alert, a mere 508 miles from the North Pole. "Permanently inhabited" means five people, according to the 2006 census, not counting the transients who pop in and out of Alert throughout the year to man the weather station and other government facilities.
If you send my wife to the North Pole, which you should, she won't be going through Alert; the trip will send her first to Norway or Lapland or someplace like that. But if she doesn't win that trip to the North Pole, I can always suggest she try to increase the population of that five-person city of Alert by 20 percent.
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
Because I don't follow any news out of Canada except when the Yankees are playing the Blue Jays, I had no idea that these Northwest Territories — which is actually one territory, even though it's plural (that's Canada for you, I suppose) — were split into two territories in 1999.
One territory is still called Northwest Territories (plural), but the other, which runs closest to the North Pole, is called Nunavut.
Okay, you're probably thinking, other than finding an excuse to blog in order to convince me to send your wife to the North Pole, why should I give a Molson Golden about this stretch of Canada?
Well, friend, here's why:
That is the Coat of Arms of Nunavut, and it is the most-badass thing I've seen in a long time. You've got a reindeer and a fucking narwhal holding some sort of crazy shield that has a bowl of chili and a smushed sword of some sort, and on top of the shield is an igloo with a crown and a porch light. Beneath the reindeer and the narwhal — which are both standing up, mind you — there's the most awesome-looking language this side of Klingon.
Clearly, they consulted the territory's most imaginative 12-year-old to create this thing. I want to wear a T-shirt with this coat of arms just to see how long people will stare at it to try to figure out what the hell is going on.
(The language is Inuktitut, the language of the Inuit, by the way. Stop by the official website of the government of Nunavut to download some Inuit fonts, and use them in your business correspondence!)
And the awesomeness doesn't stop there. Who wouldn't want to have this license plate attached to their SUV:
Yes. It's shaped like a polar bear.
Here's the flag:
Not quite as badass. It turns out that that image is not a mashed-up sword or a snowman with a giant sombrero, but an inukshuk, a kind of Inuit marker. Still, it's actually a controversial flag in the eyes of flag-watchers, according to the Wikipedia page:
"Following its adoption, the flag has been criticized for vexillological reasons. Specifically, it has been criticized for having too many colours, the placement of the star at the end of the flag, the use of gold and white as the background field, and the use of a black outline around the inukshuk."Can you just taste the controversy?
Anyway, Nunavut is home to the northernmost permanently inhabited place in the world, appropriately called Alert, a mere 508 miles from the North Pole. "Permanently inhabited" means five people, according to the 2006 census, not counting the transients who pop in and out of Alert throughout the year to man the weather station and other government facilities.
If you send my wife to the North Pole, which you should, she won't be going through Alert; the trip will send her first to Norway or Lapland or someplace like that. But if she doesn't win that trip to the North Pole, I can always suggest she try to increase the population of that five-person city of Alert by 20 percent.
* * *
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
Monday, January 17, 2011
They Don't Mutiny Like They Used To
Just about every well known thing with "Hudson" in its name is likely named for the explorer Henry Hudson. Here's one exception:
But anyway. You probably learned about Henry Hudson during a social studies class that rattled off a bunch of European explorers, and if not for notable bodies of water such as the Hudson River and Hudson Bay, you probably wouldn't be able to tell Henry Hudson — a guy who knew a few things about the frozen lands near the North Pole — from other explorers with a penchant for fancy facial hair and fancier neck accoutrements, such as Sir Walter Raleigh.
The little you probably remember about these explorer folks is, well, the stuff they explored. But for many of them, more interesting isn't how they lived, but how they died. In Sir Walter's case, he was imprisoned then beheaded, and my mother smoked Raleigh cigarettes for 20 years.
But Henry Hudson has all the other guys beat. His ship was stuck in ice in James Bay in Canada, forcing his crew to spend what was probably a winter more horrible than any of the winters I spent as a student at SUNY Buffalo. After the thaw, a large portion of the crew was looking forward to returning to their homes, but Henry said, "Hey, instead of going home, let's keep looking for that passage to Asia."
Take a look at the map below to where Hudson's ship was, and image how you'd react if you just spent the winter there and were then told you were going to Asia.
Those who disagreed were like, screw that, so they did the reasonable thing: they set Hudson, his son, and his allies on a small boat before sailing home. Hudson and company were never seen again. The mutineers — those who made it back alive — were acquitted of murder.
But Henry Hudson, wherever he ended up, got the last laugh on those mutineers. No one outside of Wikipedia has ever heard of Abacuk Pricket, while Henry Hudson endures with noble landmarks like this:
I'm asking you to send my wife to the North Pole, and I do this knowing that she's not the type of person to cause a mutiny. There are a lot of reasons I want to send her to the North Pole, but none of them want me to maroon her on a boat in the middle of Canada.
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
But anyway. You probably learned about Henry Hudson during a social studies class that rattled off a bunch of European explorers, and if not for notable bodies of water such as the Hudson River and Hudson Bay, you probably wouldn't be able to tell Henry Hudson — a guy who knew a few things about the frozen lands near the North Pole — from other explorers with a penchant for fancy facial hair and fancier neck accoutrements, such as Sir Walter Raleigh.
They also have very pointy chins.
The little you probably remember about these explorer folks is, well, the stuff they explored. But for many of them, more interesting isn't how they lived, but how they died. In Sir Walter's case, he was imprisoned then beheaded, and my mother smoked Raleigh cigarettes for 20 years.
But Henry Hudson has all the other guys beat. His ship was stuck in ice in James Bay in Canada, forcing his crew to spend what was probably a winter more horrible than any of the winters I spent as a student at SUNY Buffalo. After the thaw, a large portion of the crew was looking forward to returning to their homes, but Henry said, "Hey, instead of going home, let's keep looking for that passage to Asia."
Take a look at the map below to where Hudson's ship was, and image how you'd react if you just spent the winter there and were then told you were going to Asia.
China's just around the corner!
Those who disagreed were like, screw that, so they did the reasonable thing: they set Hudson, his son, and his allies on a small boat before sailing home. Hudson and company were never seen again. The mutineers — those who made it back alive — were acquitted of murder.
But Henry Hudson, wherever he ended up, got the last laugh on those mutineers. No one outside of Wikipedia has ever heard of Abacuk Pricket, while Henry Hudson endures with noble landmarks like this:
Take THAT, Abacuk Pricket!
I'm asking you to send my wife to the North Pole, and I do this knowing that she's not the type of person to cause a mutiny. There are a lot of reasons I want to send her to the North Pole, but none of them want me to maroon her on a boat in the middle of Canada.
* * *
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
Thursday, January 13, 2011
The North Pole-tato; or, Other North Poles, Part 2
As I'd mentioned yesterday, there are a few places that are called "North Pole" that are not the North Pole, the place I want you to send my wife (you can assist me by voting for her essay).
Yesterday's North Pole was located in Alaska, which is inaccurate in terms of geography, but at least Alaska is close to the North Pole. The others are not. Today's North Pole is arguably the strangest of all of them.
I think if an episode of Family Feud asked, "Name something that's famous about Idaho," the Survey Says answers would be:
If you said, "The North Pole is there," you'd be greeted with an annoying buzzer, a red X-in-a-box will flash over your face, and if your brood survives to battle in another episode you'll be banished to the slot at the very end of your family line, where the doddering geriatrics or spaced-out aunts usually stand.
North Pole, Idaho, does have a Wikipedia page. I'm not even going to link to it, because I can quickly tell you what it says. Enjoy:
The end.
Granted, the "town" does tend to provide Christmas-themed activities during the holidays, though those take place 18 miles away on the lovely Lake Coeur D'Alene at the Coeur D'Alene Resort in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho.
Holding "North Pole" events at a fancy-schmancy resort and not North Pole proper can be a bit misleading. Here is a photo of the resort, which I swiped from its website:
And here is a photo, from Google Maps, of what is estimated to be downtown North Pole, Idaho:
Here's another view, in case you thought you'd turn around to see Santa's workshop bustling with elves.
Anyway. The Idaho version of the North Pole is more than 2,600 miles from home, but it's still not far enough for my wife to be sent. Maybe while she's at the real North Pole, I'll sneak off and hit the Coeur D'Alene Resort...their spa packages are quite inviting.
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
Yesterday's North Pole was located in Alaska, which is inaccurate in terms of geography, but at least Alaska is close to the North Pole. The others are not. Today's North Pole is arguably the strangest of all of them.
I think if an episode of Family Feud asked, "Name something that's famous about Idaho," the Survey Says answers would be:
- Potatoes (90)
- Skiing (5)
- The funny shape of the state (4)
- Hemingway killed himself there (1)
If you said, "The North Pole is there," you'd be greeted with an annoying buzzer, a red X-in-a-box will flash over your face, and if your brood survives to battle in another episode you'll be banished to the slot at the very end of your family line, where the doddering geriatrics or spaced-out aunts usually stand.
North Pole, Idaho, does have a Wikipedia page. I'm not even going to link to it, because I can quickly tell you what it says. Enjoy:
North Pole is an unincorporated community in Kootenai County, Idaho, United States. North Pole is 3.5 miles (6 km) southwest of Athol.
The end.
Granted, the "town" does tend to provide Christmas-themed activities during the holidays, though those take place 18 miles away on the lovely Lake Coeur D'Alene at the Coeur D'Alene Resort in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho.
Holding "North Pole" events at a fancy-schmancy resort and not North Pole proper can be a bit misleading. Here is a photo of the resort, which I swiped from its website:
Note: The words in the photo ("Come Stay...," etc.)
do not actually float in the air and on the water.
And here is a photo, from Google Maps, of what is estimated to be downtown North Pole, Idaho:
Here's another view, in case you thought you'd turn around to see Santa's workshop bustling with elves.
Anyway. The Idaho version of the North Pole is more than 2,600 miles from home, but it's still not far enough for my wife to be sent. Maybe while she's at the real North Pole, I'll sneak off and hit the Coeur D'Alene Resort...their spa packages are quite inviting.
* * *
If this convinces you that you should send my wife to the North Pole, please click this text which is in fact a link that will take you to her essay so you can vote for her so she'll have a chance to go to the North Pole. Thank you.
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