I’m in Nori’s cafe, sitting on the river side, coffee in one hand, pen in the other, my yellow legal tab on the table. There’s nothing unusual about that, since I do it every day, barring out-of-area travel, out-of-control contagion, or out-of-planet intervention.

But a couple of things ARE unusual. For one, my mind is roiling and churning — a shark feeding frenzy seems a fitting metaphor. For another, I’m drumming my fingers on the table wildly, like some wired-out Speed Metal drummer.

The finger drumming is especially puzzling, since I don’t remember ever having done it. Certainly, on occasion and when lost in thought, I’ve tapped my fingers, but just by fits and starts and only for a few seconds. But now I’m doing it rapidly and nonstop. It’s as if I’m possessed, inhabited by the spirit of some now-departed table drummer or something.

As for my roiling brain? While it’s not typical, it’s understandable: I have my proverbial back against the proverbial wall.

It can best be explained by Saranac Lake summer resident and very bright boychik, Albert Einstein, in his Theory of Relativity. Simply stated, time is not a constant. Instead, it’s relative to people’s perception of it. For example, your first day in a tropical paradise will seem to go by in the blink of an eye. On the other hand, your first day in boot camp will seem a helluva lot longer.

But since I’m neither in tropical paradise nor boot camp, what’s my shtick with the Relativity of Time? It’s about Winter Carnival, that’s what. Or more exactly, how much time I have to get everything in place for my Winter Carnival events. This is perfectly illustrated by my convo with Big Daddy Harris, who comes into Nori’s mid-drum-recital-cum-brain-boiling.

BD is just the guy I want to talk to. Actually, he’s the guy I NEED to talk to, since one of my events will be at his venue, the Garagery.

“Hey,” I say, “we gotta sit down and figure out the details of the gig.”

“Plenty of time,” he says, shrugging expansively, looking every bit like the MACHER he is.

“Oh really?” I say. “You think we got plenty of time?”

“What?” he says. “Three months isn’t enough for you?”

“Three months is more than enough,” I say. “Except we don’t have three months. Matter of fact, we don’t even have two.”

“Huh?” he says. “It’s only December.”

“Correct,” I say. “December 10th, to be exact.”

Then shifting into my best teacher’s voice, as if explaining the most obvious point to the most oblivious student, I go on.

“December 10th to January 10th is one month,” I say, holding up my index finger so he can follow. “January tenth to February tenth is two months,” I say, holding up my middle finger. “But since Carnival begins on January thirty-first and ends on February ninth…”

I let my voice trail off, figuring further explanation is below what little dignity I have.

He nods, apparently following the calculations.

Then he half-harumphs and says, “Did I ever tell you I got an A in math in Paul Smith’s College?”

“A buncha times,” I say. “And it gets more fascinating with every retelling. But can we tear ourselves away from your scholarly accomplishments and talk about the event in the Garagery instead?”

“Sure, But not now,” he says. I gotta be back for a meeting with all the members of my fan club.”

“OK,” I say. “Give my fond regards to both of ’em.”

He leaves, I sit and stew.

–

Three times the charm

–

Here’s the skinny. I’m directly involved in three Winter Carnival events, involved to the extent that I’m in charge of them — at least theoretically. One is my parade unit, The Brothers of the Bush. The second is The Blue Buns Wheel-a-Palooza. And the third is the one in the Garagery, the Chucklehead Hoedown.

The parade is no problem. This’ll be the fifteenth year we’ve done it, and at this point we could do it in a trance. Matter of fact, I think some of us HAVE done it in a trance of one sort or another. But while I’m nominally in charge, I farm out a lot of the work to my stalwarts, Br. Ron Burdick, Br. Russ Defonce, Br. Joe Dadey, and Br. Jack Drury. So if anything needs to be built, painted, duct taped or zip tied, they’ll come through for me. Then there are other guys and gals who will show up, with costume and with candy, and who need no direction at all.

As for the Blue Buns? This’ll be our third year, and since it was a resounding success the first two, I don’t worry about doing much work for it to succeed on its own merits. Lest you didn’t know, The Wheel-a-Palooza is a two-lap bike ride around town, with the participants wearing bathing suits. It’s one of those events that might even be more fun to watch than to participate in, depending on how thick your skin and blood are. Once again, my crew are as dependable as they are fun. The only “work” I have to do is arranging for our police escort, and traffic control. And maybe even having one of the cops rise to the occasion and lead the pack on a cop bike. I’ve suggested to Chief Perrotte that since one leads by example, he should be the Blue Buns Blue Wheelman. The results remain to be seen.

–

The lowdown on the Hoedown

–

My last event, the one making my stomach acids flow like the wide Missouri is the Chucklehead Hoedown. And what, exactly, is THAT? Well, because I’ve never done it before, and have never even heard of such a thing taking place anywhere, I’m not sure myself. Essentially, it’ll be a Hootenanny of Hilarity, if you will.

As I envision it, people will preregister online (so we know how many folks’ll show up and what jokes they’ll tell, to prevents repeats). Then when they get there, we’ll have a sign-up sheet to arrange the order. It’ll be a round robin, so each person will tell one joke, then the next person will tell one, till we go through the roster. Then, if people have more jokes, we’ll keep going till we run out of either jokes or time.

These will be ONLY jokes — no standup, no storytelling, no personal anecdotes. Of course puns and riddles are acceptable. And as far as the jokes themselves, only clean jokes, thanks, since it’s a family-friendly event.

My intention, of course, is to just have fun — for both the audience and the jokesters themselves. I also want to see how diverse a group of jokesters we can get. F’rinstance, little kids can tell jokes, and darn funny ones at that. Also, there are people who don’t think of themselves as funny, but who in fact have a joke or two they’ve been telling for years and as a result have dynamite timing and delivery. And everyone else in between. And if you’ve never told a joke in your life, it’s a great time and place to start.

I’ll be the emcee, assisted by my second banana, Screw Loose Bruce (Young).

My dear friend Scott Eicholz, the head loon of LoonWorks Family Entertainment, will be there, making ballon figures, per request, and free of charge. And if you’ve never seen what Scott can do with balloons, let me put it as simply as possible: The lad is The Leonardo of Latex!

The optional admission fee will be a non-perishable food item, which will go to our local food bank.

In addition to giving us the room and the workers for the event, Big Daddy will give free sodas to all the joke-tellers. Of course, everyone else can spring for their own libations, plus if you want, you can order food from the Scullery, upstairs in Grizle’s.

There we be other fun things, like local luminaries taking the stage to tickle your fancy, door prizes, and of course stuff not yet thought of.

Once the details are finalized, they’ll be posted on the Winter Carnival website.

One final note is The Hoedown’s motto: “Where Yuks Are Better Than Bucks.”

And please keep in mind, that’s Yuks, not Yucks.

Hope to see — and hear — you there.

Hear! Hear!