He is the Prognosticator of Prognosticators.
He is the Seer of Seers.
If we could speak, ‘Groundhogese,’ or if the President of the Groundhog Club would listen to it on our behalf, and we could take Punxsutawney Phil to the casino, he would protect the next number to land at the roulette wheel for us unfailingly.
Except, he wouldn’t.
My fiance happens to share a birthday with what has come to be celebrated as a holiday in this country, and that day is Groundhog Day. Despite this fact, and the fact that she lives in Pennsylvania, she has never found anyone willing to endure the windy drive required to get from Pittsburgh to Punxsutawney, PA (it’s not that bad) and to brave the freezing weather (it IS that bad) as we await the prognostication of a rodent.
Fortunately, where others before me have seen silliness, I saw opportunity, the opportunity to give to my fiance the birthday present she has craved for a lifetime all while saving myself a not insignificant sum of money on what I otherwise would have gotten her. This was a true, ‘Win-Win,’ situation as I recalled a conversation from several months prior, twelve months in fact, during which she told me she’d really like to see the groundhog sometime.
I would like to say that this is an event that everyone should take the time to enjoy at least once in their lives, but for the fact that I froze my ass off (except in the, ‘Warm-Up Tent,’) I had a great time. The event takes place on a hill known as, ‘Gobbler’s Knob,’ and starts in the wee hours of the morning with live music, announcers and some food and beverage.
The actual event is about as hokey as they come, but in a fun way. It starts out with finding a place to park in one of three designated locations (we selected the parking lot of a Wal*Mart) at which point one must purchase a bus pass ($5/each) in order to be shuttled up to Gobbler’s Knob. There is no parking at Gobbler’s Knob unless you actually have something to do with the event. Aside from optional purchases, the bus passes and whatever your transportation costs are is all that is absolutely required.
I have seen reports claiming as many as 20,000 people attended the event this year, but I tend to think the number was somewhat lower than that. Having been to a number of concerts of varying sizes (so I have something against which to gauge the crowd) I would put it at more than ten thousand, but less than fifteen thousand, definitely a meaningful crowd, though.
The layout is pretty simple: After the shuttle bus drops you off, you walk under a sign that proclaims you are at Gobbler’s Knob, ‘Home of Punxsutawney Phil,’ as you begin to approach the area of the event, it seems fairly empty, but that is because there is a natural theatre that drops down a slight embankment to the stage, but you can’t really hear anything unless you are amidst the throng of people or near the top of the embankment.
The centerpiece of the walk towards the embankment is a sign (and photo op area) that talks all about Punxsutawney Phil and espouses the legend of this seemingly immortal groundhog. I’ll leave you to research the history of Groundhog Day on your own, if you don’t already know, the Wikipedia pages seem fairly accurate compared to what I have seen/read on the subject.
The theatre area is to the right of this sign and, as mentioned, down a hill while to the extreme right of the sign (and slightly behind you) about 1,000 feet (or so) away is a bonfire area with a little shack at which one can purchase T-Shirts or other Punxsutawney Phil memorabilia. Much as there would be at a rock concert, there are also a few people milling about the crowd hawking Punxy Phil shirts (short sleeve and long) as well as other memorabilia, such as hats.
If you are standing facing the main sign, then deeper into the woods and on your left will be a shelter type area in which food, (hot dogs, eggs, coffee, hot chocolate and other items) can be purchased using poker chips, (you pay cash for the chips and then give the chips to the person running concessions) and there is also a, ‘Warm-Up,’ tend (my favorite place!) which had some sort of heaters in it hooked up to one or more generators. Near this area was also an area for the parking of news trucks, of which there were a few, The Weather Channel, amongst several Pennsylvania news stations, was there.
Again, the event is pretty hokey with some local bands/singers performing as well as a few people from out of town. Other members of the Groundhog Club perform silly dances and crack jokes as they give out, ‘Thank yous,’ to the organizers and come up with various awards for things. All of those type of things continue for roughly four hours which culminates in a singing of, ‘The Star Spangled Banner,’ followed by a fireworks show. The fireworks show, I must say, is one of the best I have ever seen as it is perfectly dark and the fireworks are let off much closer to the crowd than other shows I have been to.
After that, the organizers egg the crowd on with many promises of, ‘About ten more minutes,’ or, ‘Here in just a few minutes,’ or some other such verbiage for about an hour. Eventually, the full ranks of the Groundhog Club make their way down to the stage and this is followed by a few other false starts until finally Punxsutawney Phil is let out from underneath his stump (three knocks wakes him up) to make his prediction.
Phil called six more weeks of Winter this year, looks like he may have been wrong again.
When that is complete, those who wish to endure more of the cold can have their picture taken with Phil, but my fiance and I chose instead to make our way to the shuttle buses taking us back to Wal*Mart (or one of the other two stops). There are apparently several other things that can be purchased in town, and other mini-events taking place in Punxsutawney throughout the day, but I was operating on zero sleep, so it was in our best interest to get back. I had my kids until 11:00p.m. the night before, so it was all I could do just to get to Punxsutawney in time, next time I’ll be better prepared to stay up awhile if I don’t have the kids.
The main contrast between betting system players and the Groundhog Club is that the Groundhog Club is not actually at all serious about what they are doing. In an interview for Animal Planet one of the members basically alluded to the fact that the whole thing is pretty clearly a joke, and it is how seriously the joke is taken that makes it funny.
In fact, if you were to ask how frequently Phil’s prediction proves correct, any member of the Groundhog Club would look you in the eye and say, ‘100%,’ deadpan. The truth is, Phil has historically been wrong more often than he has been right (39% success, as of last year) would actually be performing better if he simply guessed, ‘Early Spring,’ every year, and the whole thing is really just an extremely fun and silly joke that has perpetuated for 131 years.
For over 131 years, the Martingale System has been discovered and rediscovered by tens of thousands, if not more, gamblers. It has been fairly widely accepted that the Martingale can be traced back to France in the 1700’s, or so, during which time it could be applied to multiple forms of gambling. Gambling system players cling tenaciously onto these, or otherwise seemingly ridiculous and unnecessarily complicated systems hoping that they will prove to have an edge over the house. In this sense, they don’t have to prognosticate anything, but they cling fervently to the assertion that they can beat a negative expectation game with a series of negative expectation bets.
Once again, the Groundhog Club also believes in the impossible: A groundhog that has lived for (at least) 131 years. Punxsutawney Phil has been sustained by an annual dose of what is known as the, ‘Elixir of Life,’ which is given to him during a ceremony in the fall...presumably a more temperate day to visit the town! While the Groundhog Club certainly doesn’t truly believe that Phil has lived this long, (in fact, some of them obviously know that he hasn’t because they were around during at least one groundhog’s death) in their tongue-in-cheek way, they cling to their belief in the impossible.
Furthermore, as they look visitors in the eye and declare that Phil has never been wrong, (they blame any misses on the Groundhog Club President translating him wrong, and that’s only when they are publicly forced to admit a miss) they share another thing in common with betting system players: only remembering the wins. The truth is that Phil has, to date, missed 61% of the time and that’s only if we don’t count this year’s likely miss against him.
With those similarities aside, what is the biggest difference between the Groundhog Club and betting system players? While both are silly, and both are basically a joke, the Groundhog Club at least gets to have fun.
