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Shoreline Property

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Today’s post comes from Minnesota’s 9th district Congressman  Loomis Beechly, representing all the water surface area in the state.

Greetings, constituents!

What wonderful news from the surface of Mars – that the Curiosity rover has discovered evidence that the planet went through an extended period when it  was very wet, and Gale Crater was a large lake.

That makes Mars very much like Minnesota, notwithstanding the  uninhabitable bleakness of its current configuration.

You decide which one I was referring to right there.  Hard to do?  You bet!   Mars and Minnesota – separated at birth!

That’s why I intend to introduce a bill in Congress to make Gale Crater our first off-planet sister state!  Is Congress even the place to do that?  I have no idea – it’s never been done before!

We have so much in common, including a history of splashing streams and bubbling rivulets leading into large, round bodies of water boasting pristine shorelines and magnificent views.

And I’m sure as Curiosity continues its explorations it will find the same things we expect to uncover on the bottom of all Minnesota lakes – lots of fishing tackle,  boots, and beer cans.

Mark my words – the amazing discovery that will cinch it is bound to be something like a hat.     Why?  Because all the elements are there.

  1. Standing Water means there was a shoreline.
  2. A shoreline means there was shallow water.
  3. Shallow water means sunlight warming the soil, which leads to life.
  4. Life leads to boats, and docks.
  5. Where there is light and boats and life, there will be floating around on a lazy Sunday afternoon, and napping.
  6. Where there is prolonged exposure to the sun on water, there will be hats.
  7. Where there is napping and hats and wind, there will be hats overboard.

That’s just science.  I’m serious.  Curiosity should be scanning the bottom of Gale Crater for hats.  And when we find the first one, I want it to already be a law that Minnesota and Mars are sisters!

Get ready – the family is about to become larger!

Your Congressman,
Loomis Beechly

What have you lost in the lake?

45 thoughts on “Shoreline Property”

  1. Good morning. Anyone who has gone fishing has lost fish hooks and other tackle. I am sure many people have also lost hats, as Beechly mentioned, when out in boats. Of course, other things can be accidentally lost in lakes such as a very nice knife that I dropped into deep water and was not able to recover. Maybe, as I’m sure Bathtub Safety Officer Rafferty would say, we should stay on solid ground where it isn’t so easy to lose things.

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  2. i have lost a couple of things in the lake but a bunch of stuff in the river.
    in the lake the most memorable loss was my ring. I was swimming in the lake and felt the ring sliding off my finger so I tok it off and threw it to my friend standing on shore. it hit the rope swing hanging form the overhanging branch and fell into the water. I went over and lifted up the first handful of sand form the bottom and the ring was there and slid off to be covered with the sand I had just sifted through. I had to dig another 20 or 30 minutes before I found it I put it back on my finger and swam out only fto feel it slipping off again so I threw it up to the guy again only to hit the rope again and have it fall in the water again. this time lost forever. can you say duh!
    in the river all you have to do is dump your canoe in the rapids without the cool water bags they have nowadays for canoe people. we used to use garbage bags. they look good as the swirl away before going under in the swift current. coolers float a long way. we even lot a kayak one year up in steves brule river after a big rain. the outfitter said it got turned in later in the summer but man was he upset that we lost a kayak before we even got rolling. we had the kayaks delivered the night before and he said the water would go down and be safe in the morning so we all nodded and as he drove away we jumped in and took em for a test drive. it was a little drunk out at the time and the boats lacked stability so when the guy too drunk to whistle tipped and filled his kayak with water we made sure he got safely to shore but his boat never did. it never came up. what the heck…… that was an uncomfortable trip to tell the outfitter that we needed one more kayak. yeah it just got lost…
    great trips every first week in june.

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  3. Rise and Shine Baboons!

    The family story most famous about “lost in the lake” goes way back (NOTE WAY BACK MACHINE) to the mid-sixties when my mom decided to take the family fishing to Storm Lake, IA. The characters involved were as follows:

    Mom–age 34
    Grandpa–age 65, diabetic, going blind, not steady on his feet
    Dad–age 34, has MS, in a wheelchair
    Me–age 8
    Sister–age 5
    Brother–age 2

    We were fishing on a concrete pier. My cute little red-haired brother had a 1/2 piece of gum in his mouth. It fell out of his mouth into the lake. Johnny jumped in after it. Grandpa jumped in after Johnny. My dramatic sister screamed loudly and with gusto. The brakes on Dad’s wheelchair let go and he tipped into the lake. My mom hauled them all out and we went home. The gum still resides in Storm Lake.

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    1. I believe Blevins Book Club is at my house on Sunday Dec. 14, 2pm. It has been so long since I could attend that I have lost track of the alleged book which gives an alleged purpose to this gathering which is really just to gather. VS is bringing cookies I hope.

      If there is a Vikings game, I would be glad to turn it on with no sound.

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      1. I believe the books are:
        “American Gods” by Neil Gaiman
        “Tribes” by Seth Godin
        I will once again not be able to attend. Double unfortunate since, for a change, I have read at least one of the books. If a volunteer is needed to host the February gathering, I can do it. We are in the midst of moving to West St. Paul and should be settled by then.

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        1. OC – we’ll put you down for February. And you and Jacque are correct – this Sunday at Jacque’s, 2 p.m., American Gods and Tribes. And I am indeed bringing cookies!

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      1. this was pluggged in with jacques family following one after the other into the lake but with the way the string works here on the reply network i am way down here non recognizable as a reply to the above comment. teach me to be asleep at the switch

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    1. my son lost his raybans on our camping trip to ely as we were getting in the car to go home. I talked him into paddleing back to the campsite and playing reverse dick tracy and we found them . I was a hero for a minute or two

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  6. My first and only pair of prescription sunglasses…in Spirit Lake at Donna’s cabin. (Doona Detuna, where are you?)

    Now rivers… watched one of my tennis shoes go sailing down the Big Thompson River (outside of Estes Park, CO) while sitting on a big rock – wanted to feel the rushing stream on my feet and woops!

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  7. Pretty funny stuff this morning!

    Last fall my family took a trip up to a cabin owned by the family of my brother’s best friend. My brother loves that family and they love him, which is a good thing. He has free use of this gorgeous ‘cabin’ any time he wants it. It’s really nice. We use both boats, kayaks, the grill and the outdoor fireplace. We use the boats to go fishing.

    My brother was raised like me- by my dad. He ALWAYS checks everything before heading out. He did that morning too, right before heading out for some fishing with Nick, his son. There were two motors on the little fishing boat, which is also a good thing. They got out there but turned around and came right back. The trolling motor had fallen into the lake.

    My brother has always been a good swimmer- another good thing. He dove and dove but ended up buying a new trolling motor.

    I’ve lost a few things in the lake, I suppose. They couldn’t have been too important. Like tim, I lost a backpack and my mom’s canoe in the Cannon River. I had to get a salvage company to get the canoe out. The backpack is long gone. For me, it’s more about what I’ve found in the Lake that matters.

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      1. Cool!
        If you look at the photos on that site, one of the ships pictured says “POLSTEAM” on the side. I saw it leave the harbor last night. It was huge! The emblem on its side had a trident with the letters P, Z, M. I wonder if it was from Poland?

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  9. many a spoon in the lake that never gives up its dead
    my glasses on vacation off a dock back when I had very bad eyesight, a kid took it as a challenge to find them, which he did
    very high pain day nuff typing for awhile

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  10. I loved both my parents and felt loved in return, but the years when I was 12 and 13 were pretty darn messy. I was beginning to think for myself and my folks were beginning to nag at me for various character flaws. My self confidence was at miserable low levels.

    My dad and I went fishing one morning quite early. He decided we would cast our lures in Long Lake’s northern end. My fishing rig was an early model of a spinning rod. When you snapped the bail open the line spilled effortlessly off the end of the spool.

    On one cast I reached back to far, snagged my Lazy Ike on the side of the boat and (surprised by the snagging) threw my rod and reel into the depths of the north end. With its bail open, the rod and reel slid out of sight in the dark water. I leaped to grab the lure snagged on our boat gunwale.

    That meant I could retrieve the rod and reel . . . IF I had tied a good knot to the reel when I replaced the line. There was a right and wrong way to do that. The right way was to tie a knot and then fill the spool. The easy (wrong) way was to just lap the loose end under fresh wraps and then fill the spool. If I had done it the easy way, I had no real connection to my rod and reel.

    “I’ll bet you didn’t tie a knot,” said my disgusted father.

    “I DID!”

    “You probably just lapped the line end. We’ll never see that rod and reel again!”

    “I DID tie a knot!” (Actually, I had NO idea if I had. As a kid, I often took shortcuts, doing things the easy way, not the right way. I began pulling line into the boat. My dad went on telling me I had not tied a knot and so I’d lose the rod and reel. I went on filling the boat bottom with all the loose monofilament I was pulling in. I went on insisting I’d tied a knot, but tears of shame were sliding down my cheeks.

    And then I felt the weight of the rod and reel. My white rod became visible in the dark water below the boat. Soon I sat in the boat with over a hundred yards of monofilament around my feet, but with my fishing rod back in my hands. I had tied a knot. I hadn’t totally shamed myself. But the day was young . . . .

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        3. Thanks for the heads up! I bought my HD radio that very day. I’ve got a solid day of working at hone tomorrow, so looking forward to it.

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    2. I was in that audience–maybe you can hear me cheering in there. At 6am in the morning I sat by an odorific drunk lady who slept snoring through most of the show while I cried through most of the show. Oh, Dale, what I suffered for you and Jim Ed. You don’t even know.

      I have an in office paperwork day scheduled tomorrow. i will listen!

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  12. Husband was once fishing at the local dike here, a small dam just outside of town that Game and Fish has stocked and that has accessible docks. He snagged and reeled in a child’s rod and reel that had a boy’s name written on it. This is a small town. One of my developmentally disabled clients had lost his rod and reel in the lake earlier in the summer, and the name on the reel was the name of my client. He thought us totaly magical when I brought his lost rod and reel to our next session.

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  13. OT: I am in a downtown neighborhood coffee house, which is so much more interesting than the chains. I find here some distraction from the debilitating pain that has settled on me in the last three days.

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  14. No Loser, No Weeper
    “I hate to lose something,”
    then she bent her head,
    “even a dime, I wish I was dead.
    I can’t explain it. No more to be said.
    ‘Cept I hate to lose something.
    “I lost a doll once & cried for a week.
    She could open her eyes, and do all but speak.
    I believe she was took, by some doll-snatiching sneak.
    I tell you, I hate to lose something.
    “A watch of mine once, go up & walked away.
    It had twelve numbers on it & for the time of day.
    I’ll never forget it and all I can say
    Is I really hate to lose something.
    “Now if I felt that way ‘bout a watch & a toy,
    What you think I feel `bout my lover-boy?
    I aint threatening you, madam, but he is my evening’s joy.
    And I mean I really hate to lose something.”
    -Maya Angelou

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  15. when i was 3 my aunt who was 17 took e up to leach lake for the weekend with my grandparents and we wnet swimming on the beautiful white sand beach where the beach house was. the sand was a long stretch of beach and it also went out a long way before it went over your head even as a munchkin. you would hit a deep spot but only for 20 or 30 feet then it was 3 -4 feet deep again. my grandfather had her take me swimming because he was busy but told her i needed to wear a life jacket because i was too young to know how to swim. i objected but he didnt want to put it up for a vote. there was a new littel kid life perserver but it was umcomfortable so i asked if i could use he other older one. it was old and faded and so very comfortable to wear. when i jumped in the water to swim i found that the life perserver allown me to move pretty well. i even got to swim underwater like my hero tarzan on the johnny weismiller movies with it on. it provided just the right amount of buoyancy and distraction so we had a gas until my grandfather came and saw me having the time of my life swimming like a fish underwater and he pointed out to my aunt if i was able to go underwater that the life preserver wasnt working properly. he made her put that damn new one on me and it kept me on top of the lake. its no fun to be on top of the lake. i lost my fear of swimming, my mistaken premise that my grandfather knew his ass from a hole in the ground and indifference about being forced to wear a life preserver. they are fine for saving your life but… not to be worn but simply to be accessed in case of emergency.

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