Maine Minutiae : Save Your Marriage! Carry Your Wife!

There are few things in this world that come anywhere near leaving me speechless. What I am about to describe to you damn near did it. Human beings will do almost anything for amusement and/or competition. There are such events as the Calaveras (CA) County Fair and Jumping Frog Jubilee, Watermelon Thump in Luling, Texas, where the biggest attraction is the watermelon seed spitting contest and 35,000 people attend each year, and here's a new one to me that recently took place right here in Maine - The North American Wife Carrying Championships!  I mean, we don't get the Olympics, NASCAR, NFL, Major League Baseball and whatnot, but we do make a sport of wife carrying! Just imagine the fun and companionship to be had by couples from all around the country.

• Wife to husband : "Honey, I have just the thing that could save our marriage." 
• Husband : "And that would be what?"
• Wife : "You could carry me!"
• Husband : "I've been doing that for the last 25 years."
• Wife : "No,dear. I mean you could carry me in the North American Wife Carrying Championships!"
• Husband : "You do love me! Our marriage is saved!"

 The object of this "sport" is to navigate a 278 yard course lined with mud holes and all sorts of fun obstacles like that while carrying your wife on your back! What fun! The people who participate in wife carrying are deadly serious about it, why they've even got specialized ways for a man to carry his better half. From ABCNews.com we learn : "Carrying methods include traditional piggyback, the fireman’s carry or something called the “Estonian carry,” said Paula Wheeler, director of development for the Mahoosuc Arts Council, the event’s sponsor." The "Estonian carry" sounds particularly menacing (or pornographic, I ain't sure which). The best thing about this event, besides the certain hilarity that ensues, is what the winner receives as a prize. I.Am.Not.Making.This.Up. His wife's weight in beer! There is a God! You now understand what people who live in a place like Maine, where there are about 8 months winter, do during those long cold times. They make up stuff like wife carrying! And curling, but that's another story for another day. If every married couple in the United States took part in wife carrying, the divorce rate would plummet. The alcoholism rate among married men would skyrocket (see prize for winners), but those men would be happily married drunks. In my view, it all evens out. :) For those of you who are considering wife carrying as a marriage-enhancing tool, I'll leave you with info on the 2011 World Wife Carrying Championships to be held in Finland. I almost forgot that there is a division in this competition for women who want to carry their husbands! Equal opportunity, you gotta love it. I am curious here, what is the wife's prize if she wins? Her husband's weight in bon bons?