Country Quilt

Saturday, February 2, 2013

Holiday #1 for February: Groundhog's Day!

It's hard to believe that another holiday is upon us!  I haven't even finished eating all of my Christmas candy, yet!  But here we are in February, a shortened month crammed full of holidays!  Today we celebrate the Groundhog!  A fat little rodent from Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania who somehow manages to write a bunch of big words on a scroll, then gives it to a guy in a tuxedo and top hat, who then let's us know if Spring is coming early this year!

As crazy as it all sounds,  every year I love to find out if that pudgy animal saw his shadow or not.  And I blame all of it on my high school biology teacher, Mr. Rushing.  Every year on Groundhog day, he would throw a pop quiz.  As a freshman and never having Mr. Rushing for a biology teacher when you hear pop quiz coming out of his mouth, you panic.  He made us number a paper from 1 to 5 and would then proceed to ask us questions about Groundhog's Day.  We had to know what his name was, Punxsutawney Phil, and it had to be spelled right, where he was from, did he see his shadow, and what does it mean if he sees his shadow and what does it mean if he doesn't.  Thank goodness it was for extra credit and not part of your grade.  Fast forward to sophomore year and you once again have Mr. Rushing for Human Anatomy and it's Groundhog Day and he calls for a pop quiz.  Good thing you remembered to get up early to watch the Today show and get all the answers so you can ace that quiz, only to realize you can't remember how to spell Punxsutawney and Mr. Rushing still gets you.  Forward one more time to Junior year when you are Mr. Rushing's teachers aide and you can now sit back with a smirk and watch the looks of horror on the freshman's faces when he calls Pop Quiz time!  Priceless!!

I will admit that I watched the proclamation being read this morning.  I also have books for the girls about Groundhog's Day that we read.  And thanks to a picture one of my friends put on facebook today, I might even make a Groundhog cake for next year.

That crazy groundhog Phil did see his shadow this year so I guess we will be getting an early spring.  I don't mind as long as there is one significant snowfall yet before we enter into baseball season.  I mean spring.

2 comments:

  1. Count me in for cake next year!

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  2. Hahaha...I didn't remember Mr. Rushing's groundhog quiz. I do remember having to be able to spell "congratulations" correctly with a "t" or else you got a zero on the spelling test, that's come in really handy over the years.

    I'm with you on the snow, I'm hoping this winter has at least one good sledding day left.

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