The year is 2035 and debate is raging at the Capitol in St. Paul about where to place a gaggle of bronze statues lawmakers commissioned to "commemorate" the transition in Minnesota between two major epochs, the Pre-Invasive Carp Period, otherwise commonly referred to as the "fun" time of human existence in the state, and the Post-Invasive Carp Period, or what some wise-guy scribes have labeled "Depression+Pandemic, Only Worse."
Construction of the statues was authorized earlier in the 2035 legislative session in an attempt to quell public uprisings that threatened not only lawmakers' jobs but, worse, their per diems.
The same 2035 legislators cooked up the euphemism "commemorate" to justify allocation of $5 million for the half-dozen statues that now await arrangement either on (a) the Capitol Mall, where the officeholders will be frozen in disgrace for all time, or (b) along the St. Croix River in downtown Stillwater, whose business leaders have attempted valiantly to replace, with no luck, its storied Lumberjack Days with Whack-a-Carp Weekend, or (c) scattered along the Minnesota River from its confluence with the Mississippi to its headwaters in Big Stone Lake, a distance of 332 miles that features, by last count, 432,879 jumping carp.
