Shitty-whipping in the news

Good friend, long-time Rambles reader, and former Minnesotan JMike emails with this message.

I grew up in Minnesota and learned a bunch of local-isms:

• “ish” (general expression of disgust, see also “ishy”)
• “doy” (local variation of “duh”, i.e. what is said to mock someone who is
  acting in a way the mocker associates with stupidity)

• “skitch” (to grab onto the back bumper of a usually-unsuspecting car and
  ride along on packed-snow-covered streets)

But when my friends and drove over to Creek Valley elementary school (“Creek
Valley” being one of the few phrases where the typical Edina resident would
pronounce it “kreek” instead of “krick”) to drive circles in the
recent snowfall in their asphalt-covered portion of the playground, we
always referred to it as “doing donuts”. I’ve never heard of “whipping
shitties”.

Tipped off by JMike that maybe it was just a hack after all, I did a little research (okay, I typed the words “whipping shitties” into Google). I discovered, as is so disturbingly often the case in blogland, that everyone was saying the same thing as me. This page has been blogged a thousand times (of course!) and everyone seizes on this one phrase (of course!) and wonders aloud: can it be real? But entry number five on the Google list was this Best Cheap Thrill from the Twin Cities’ City Pages 1998 Best Of list. Read it and wonder no more, for the Minnesotans have spoken.

By the way, Google considerately and delicately inquired, was I perhaps actually looking for “whipping sites.” I was not. But thanks for asking.