NTMP 133: Dam Ryan

UnTILLFART we meet again

New-To-Me Phrases, February 23, 2025

PLOWABUNGA! * Northern shoveler * Autogolpe * Snowblew * Sigourney Beaver * Cake bandit * STENKLÖVER

Photo by Paul Crook on Unsplash

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The Phrases, With Context

Hi. How are you? That’s a loaded question these days. Everything is too much. It’s a firehose of fuckery, an onslaught of oligarchic cruelty, a shitstorm of technocratic slop, all aimed at our democracy and the most vulnerable among us.

Whatever little things I’m doing in my own corner of the world—writing and calling my senators and rep, donating to our library’s food pantry, asking how my queer kids are holding up and listening to their responses, checking in with friends, explaining to people that government isn’t supposed to run like a business, sending money where I can—I keep saying, “It’s not much, but it’s not nothing.”

Hell, my senator read part of my story—with permission—on the Senate floor a couple of weeks ago. I’d written expressing concern about gutting our government when I have a disabled family member who is entirely reliant on Social Security and Medicaid to exist.

So please don’t think your calls and presence don’t matter. Keep showing up. We need you. Channel your rage and fear and hope into tiny acts of courage. Try not to give in to the doomer voices within or around you that tempt you to check out. If you’re overwhelmed, pick one thing.

And repeat after me: It’s not much, but it’s not nothing.

Screw it; let’s do a poll.

You don’t need context for these polls. It can help, but it’s not needed.

And now for this edition’s phrases. Let’s get to it!

1. Plowabunga!

I love a pal who sends me snowplow names. This one comes via the Minnesota Department of Transportation, whose social media team made a chart of this year’s entries, which received over 23,000 votes:

I’d assumed Anthony Sledwards was a nod to the actor from ER, but it’s more likely a reference to the Minnesota Timberwolves player.

You’re Welcome feels very “Minnesota nice,” too.

MNDOT lists some of the names that didn’t make the, uh, blade at the link. Meltin’ John got a laugh, as did 867-530 Brine. (Thanks to Kelly Jensen for this one!)

2. Northern shoveler

A new-to-me bird! Found via a great U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service meme on IG. It’s worth a click. Do it. Do it now!

OK, if you’re off Meta—which many are—and you can’t access it because Meta fundamentally sucks—the meme says:

• Your chances of being killed by a northern shoveler are very low

  

  Image via USFWS on Instagram

Here’s the caption:

Don’t worry, that shoveler is harmless… or is it…

The gentle northern shoveler is aptly named for its shovel-like bill. That bill has hundreds of comb-like structures called lamellae, that are used to strain food out of the water.

I wonder if the person who made that meme still has a job. I hope so. I’d never heard of the Northern shoveler, but a couple of friends who live in the Western U.S. had. Turns out they migrate through my part of the country but don’t nest here.

3. Autogolpe

I’ve read many stories on social from federal workers who were (very likely illegally) fired without cause or warning over the past couple of weeks. It’s gutting to read these accounts, but I’m glad they are getting out there. Are any conservatives reading them? I hope so. I’m sure conservatives are being fired right along with liberals, assuming the leopards would never eat THEIR faces.

Tech journalist Brian Merchant at

Blood in the Machine

featured a few stories in a recent post, including this one:

“Oh you know, watching an autogolpe from the inside,” . . . “Feeling ten years of painstaking work to build up culture and credibility around digital transformation in the government get burned to the ground in less than three weeks.”

“Fearing for my job, fearing for my family's safety,” he says. “You know, the usual.”

And this is how I learned that an autogolpe—a Spanish term first used in the early 1970s—is a coup from the inside. I hope these federal workers unite and sue the fuck out of DOGE.

4. Snowblew

We had some snow recently—finally!—and I got the chance to use our new snowblower. We have one of those “suburban aspirational wealth” loooong curved driveways on a corner lot, so it was quite a project.

Afterward, while bragging about my athleticism, I wondered what the past tense for snowblowing might be. Snowblew? Snowblowed?

Turns out snowblew is a type of backformation, where new words are created from existing words by moving some linguistic furniture around, according to the hosts of That’s What They Say on Michigan Public Radio. I snowblew it!

5. Sigourney Beaver

Found this via a fave TV writer, Maureen Ryan, on Bluesky. Block Club Chicago wrote about a “remarkably rotund” beaver hanging out along the Chicago River. A local nonprofit, Urban Rivers, is running a contest to name her.

Lori Heavyfoot, Southside Large Marge, Dam Ryan, Sufjan Beavens and Sigourney Beaver are some top contenders suggested by people on Reddit.

Great video at that Reddit link, FYI. She’s probably pregnant, by the way. Let a girl be round, MAHA fat shamers!

If you consider yourself a master phrasemaker, now’s your chance: you can submit your own name ideas to Urban Rivers. Urban Rivers also has webcams where you can try to get a glimpse of the beaver and her family. I’ve kayaked around that area, back when it was profitable to be a family travel writer without having to be an influencer. Saw an egret and a huge snapping turtle! Highly recommend.

Related: Just this weekend I saw a red pickup truck with the license plate LRG MRG. IYKYK.

6. Cake bandit

We love it when an animal makes the news; it’s a much-needed distraction. In this case, a possum ate an entire Costco tuxedo cake. Have you seen those things? Not possums, but the cakes? I’ve had smaller dining tables.

In Omaha, a possum got into a family home, ate an entire jumbo cake, and crashed out on their brand new white sectional couch. Just boss behavior all around. Then the cake regret set in. The family brought the cake bandit to the Nebraska Humane Society to recover. Turns out crime does pay, because the feral forager was also suffering from acute lead poisoning so they’re getting treatment for that.

7. STENKLÖVER

My friend

Randal Cooper

tagged me with this screenshot from the game Real Bird Fake Bird, where you try to guess real vs. fake words or phrases:

I don’t mean to be all English-language biased, but I do wonder sometimes if the folks at IKEA name these products in this way on purpose.

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Bonus Bits

1. It’s-a me, Luigi

With all the appropriate disclaimers that violence is not the answer and shouldn’t be our first response to solving societal ills, I recently saw ‘Luigi’ used in the wild as a verb. As in: “Somebody needs to Luigi these guys.”

2. Gulf of Mexico memes

I’m into them. Clearly.

Speaking of maps, is anyone collecting screenshots of storms that look like penises? I feel like somebody should. That’s why god invented Tumblr, after all.

That’s it for this week! Remember to keep making it weird and to stay furiously curious.