Because snowmobiles float. ... apparently

I've noticed that people up here are really into their winter sports. When I tell them I've never been skiing, they are surprised. When I tell them that I can't ice skate, they tend to look at me like I'm crazy.

In fact, some people up here seem to be so enamored of their winter sports, they have found ways to enjoy them during the summer, too. And I'm not talking about people on cool-looking cross-country practice skis. I've seen that, and it frankly looks bad-ass. I wish I was that hard core.

But no. We're not talking about being prepared and toned for winter sports. We're talking inventing entirely new sports, with which to enjoy winter sporting equipment.

To that end, someone discovered that snowmobiles float. On non-frozen water. And then one of the towns up here decided to host a "Snowmobile Regatta." Because it's just not enough to play with snowmobiles six months of the year.

And these guys - and one lone woman - who do this are so much cooler than I could ever hope to be. True, I did not talk to any of them. But they were ripped. And well over 30. Which is impressive.

I discovered this was happening and of course had to see it to believe it. The beach - which is little more than a sandy strip along a river - was packed with spectators. Including several of my friends and neighbors. It was quite the event.

It's also relatively simple - two or three guys on snowmobiles drive up to the edge of the water. Before the heat starts, they have to pause to get all the sand out from the bottom of the snowmobile. Then they floor it and have to do a few laps around some buoys. The trick is that if they go too fast, too slow, or raise their front ends too high, they sink. And when they sink, they have to be rescued by a pimped-out pontoon boat thing with a crane attached. I guess they cover the engines with rubber or somehow seal them to keep water from getting inside and destroying the engine.

But when they do sink, the drivers sink with them, and just hang out until the boat comes to rescue them. It's so the crane guys can find the snowmobile, which is obviously not down too deep, but you couldn't see it, resting on the bottom. It's very similar to Mario Kart for N-64 - when you drive off the course and you have nothing to do but wait until the little dude in the cart picks you up.

It was an all-day event with concessions and other stuff to buy. I didn't stay the whole day, but once again, I found myself cheering the racers on and groaning - and laughing - when they sank, just like everyone else. It's hilarious, and it just sucks you in. Fantastic. I sincerely hope that there was an award ceremony at the end of it.

The first weekend

All over the north country, there appear to be lots of town and village festivals. I guess since there's not too much else to do, local chambers of commerce and the like get inventive. So my first weekend in my apartment, I experienced my village's very own summer festival.

And it was hilarious. Of course it had the necessary craft fair and a radio station was there. And it ended in fireworks and there was fried dough and a book sale at the library. But that can be found anywhere.

The highlight - and the only part I really got to see - involved bed races. Two gurney-looking things, teams of five, and a stretch of Main Street, which of course, had been closed down for the affair.

How it works:
Four people push the "bed" - one at each bedpost.
One person on top of the bed, holding on for dear life.
Oh, the bed has wheels.
The team pushes the bed down maybe 50 feet of Main Street.
They stop, the one on top has to get off and chug a small cup of beer.
Jump back on and away they race to the top.

It was done in heats - two teams at a time. Until of course, one of the wheels broke off one of the beds and snapped in half because of the massive cracks on one side of the street. Then they did it one at a time, but the one team that went fastest of the two paired together advanced to the next heat. Obviously, it was sponsored by the biker bar across the street from my apartment. That's key.

It was awesome. The street was packed with people watching, the team member on top got progressively more drunk as the heats went on, and at one point, one of the beds actually flipped over. That was fantastic. Thankfully, no one was hurt. Ironically, that was not when the wheel snapped in half, though it may have compromised its structural integrity.

At first I thought it was absolutely the stupidest thing I've ever seen. Then, to my surprise, I got totally into it and was rooting for a team or two - cheering them on and everything. Granted, I was cheering quietly - I wasn't whooping or anything. And one of the teams I was rooting for actually won, so that was even cooler.

Then there were the duck races. I had to leave before they started, but I heard about them. It involved plastic ducks - think rubber ducks but not squeezable. The woman who owns the hardware store, and is great, went around in a ridiculous hat that looked like a duck's head - complete with beak in place of the rim and a tuft of feather at the crown. This is a 50+ year old woman, by the way. She was selling the ducks to residents, along with plastic quackers to "cheer on" your not-quite-sentient duck.

There's nothing funnier than seeing grown men and women with quackers around their necks, blowing them - they sounded kind of like kazoos as blown by a duck - in each other's faces. And precious little more annoying after the first 15 minutes when you have neither your own quacker nor a beer - or five - in your hand.

The race part, which I didn't see, apparently had to do with the plastic ducks being released down a short, netted, stretch of the river to float down to the finish line. I'm not sure how they could tell the ducks apart, but I wouldn't put it past some people to decorate theirs with glitter, or at least sharpies. I would have.

Of frogs. And jumping.

Mark Twain wrote "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County." Never having been much of a Twain fan, I've never read it. But I never stopped to think that frog jumping had more of an impact on society than that story.

Then I came here.

I was desperate for something to do after I came up here. I was living in a variety of hotels at the time, as my apartment wasn't ready for me yet. So I couldn't distract myself with cleaning or shopping or decorating.

So I ended up at a frog jumping contest on a Thursday, surrounded by dozens of kids under 13 and their slimy green companions. And their patient, long-suffering parents, some of whom actually caught the frogs their kids were using in the contest.

I expected to walk into a brightly-lit gym, perhaps with the court divided up into lanes, with a kid eagerly holding his frog, waiting for the signal to release and let the little thing make its bid for freedom.

That, however, was not the case.

The hockey/lacrosse/soccer/whatever-else arena was dim and nearly empty. I walked in to find a group of parents and their children surrounding a circle about 15 feet in diameter. Each familial cluster had some kind of container alongside it. Every group had a bucket, tackle box, Tupperware, or even in one case a pink plastic hamper with a pig on it, holding at least one frog. Some kids had even decorated their containers with paint, glitter or stickers for the occasion. They were the ones who clearly did this often. And they were really into it.

They had strategies - picking a certain size frog. Some preferred using the straw to blow, some slapped the ground to get them to move. Some poked the poor captive's rumps when the judges weren't looking (that's against the rules).

The kids - and their frogs - went one at a time. The children had to coax their frogs to leap out of the circle faster than any other frog in the age group. There was a time limit, which was good, because some frogs had no interest in moving, no matter how hard their captors slapped or blew. And some kids, adorably, just froze up once they found themselves in the limelight, away from the shelter of Mom's or Dad's legs in the crowd of strangers.

At the end of the event, which took a couple hours, there was an awards ceremony. It was kind of cute - they had prizes and trophies with little rubber frogs on top. Of course, no trophy manufacturer makes such things. The organizers get them made specially by a trophy shop where the owner is willing to go out and buy frogs (think rubber duckies but a different species) to glue on top of the pedestals.

After the whole crazy spectacle, the kids were reminded to let their frogs go where they were caught. As opposed, I guess, to throwing a barbecue of frog legs.