Over the weekend, the St. Cloud Times recently reported that Albany High School hosted a Knowledge Bowl. Kinda lame, right?

WRONG!

You know why? Because garden gnomes were awarded to the winners as trophies!

PREPOSTEROUS!

The article reported that “Members of 62 teams from around Central Minnesota competed, first in a 60-question written round, followed by four 45-question oral rounds, where three teams per room competed against each other to answer questions covering a variety of academic subjects. Teams were playing for the coveted Gnome Awards, trophies shaped like garden gnomes.”

Gnome awards? I’d like to know exactly how many questions those bratty kids answered correctly that had anything to do with gnomes. Anything, whatsoever! I bet my bum that all of the questions were related to pop culture or mathematics or literature.

WE ARE NOT TROPHIES! WE ARE LIVING, BREATHING SOULS WORTHY OF LOVE AND ADMIRATION!

Shame on you. Shame, shame on you.
Dumblebore The Gnome

Even those people who aren’t interested gnomes (freaks) have probably heard of one gnome in particular. He’s practically unavoidable these days.

THE TRAVELOCITY GNOME.

According to Time Magazine, the famous Travelocity gnome is over 300 years old and is from North Carolina. His fame came about around 2004 with the travel company’s “Where’s my gnome?” ads on TV. The lucky bastard has since gotten opportunities to hang out at ice hotels, Hawaiian volcanoes, and go cliff diving.

Dude even hosted his own travel contest recently! According to the New York Times, “The centerpiece of the campaign is a contest, open to travelers ages 21 and older, with a grand prize of a trip around the world for two valued at $65,000 and a chance to appear in a Travelocity commercial.”

While he’s been gallivanting around and flaunting his riches, what have the rest of us gnome been doing? Standing around. Working. Drinking. Blogging. Nothing nearly so glamorous.

While we all feel pangs of jealousy when talking about the Travelocity gnome, we have a certain amount of respect for him at the same time. After all, he did bring attention and awareness about gnomish culture to humans around the world. Almost all gnomes wholeheartedly support travel adventures, so at least he has stayed true to his roots despite his commercialism.

He’s a bit of a sell-out, but his head is still in the right place. I can’t say as much for some of our residents of The Gnome Abode, who are awaiting epoxy re-capitation surgery.

So when the Travelocity gnome’s third cousin stopped by to visit this weekend, we welcomed him in with open arms. Here he is posing in our hallway…

Kinda looks like his famous third cousin, doesn’t he? He’s way more down-to-earth though and we welcome him to stay with us for as long as he pleases. Plus, he has an amazing British accent. Not enough of the gnomes around here have accents, and it’s nice to hear  foreign talk from time to time.

Some of his favorite phrases are “It’s amazing where you can go without ever moving” and “I see London, I see France. Oh dear, I see someone’s underpants.” He doesn’t seem like the smartest gnome in the garden, but everything sounds smarter in British so we forgive him.

To our new twice-removed famous friend! Cheers!

Sincerely yours,
Maurice The Gnome

As a wee lil’ gnome, I once read storybook about these strange creatures called dogs. I always figured they were mythical beings, much like mermaids or wizards.

Today, I was proven wrong. Because I have met a dog. A real. Life. Dog. They DO exist!

As you may know, Ramon LeBeef (pictured in green on the left) is a HUGE animal rights activist. Apparently, he met this lil’ bugga on the southbound 49 bus the other day and invited him over for dinner.

Lil’ bugga’s name is Pepe. I guess he’s alright, but I don’t really get what his deal is. He ate his dinner in about three bites. He makes this weird sound that Ramon refers to as a “bark”. He only pees and poops outside (who does that?!) Ramon says that if he eats even one chocolate chip he’ll have to have his stomach pumped. What a sad, sad existence.

Some of the lady gnomes said that he was super soft to cuddle with. I do NOT cuddle. I tried bonding with Pepe in the only way I know how to. By offering him a beer.

He didn’t seem interested in beer and he didn’t seem interested in me. Hmmph. Are dogs inherently sober? If so, I’m not sure that we’ll ever get along. Is this dog below the legal canine drinking age?  Are they more into hard liquor?

I really hope Ramon makes a follow up post to explain dogs to me and the rest of us gnomes. Hint hint, Ramon.

Utterly baffled,
Seamus The Gnome