New name for Nygren?

As I wrote a comment today to an article online in the Northwest Herald, I used the description of the McHenry County Sheriff as "seldom seen". Back in the foggy recesses of my mind, I knew that phrase, but where had I read it?

Thanks to Google, I found it quickly. "Seldom Seen" Smith was a character in one of my favorite books, The Monkey Wrench Gang, by Edward Abbey.

It's a great story, and I read it while on a whitewater raft trip through the Grand Canyon in 1981. There were 15 of us in three little rafts for 23 days! What a trip. I shared the rowing of one of the rafts with another man. You don't just float on the Colorado River; you have to row much of the 280 miles.

So maybe this "Seldom Seen" should become the nickname for the current McHenry County Sheriff. He gets paid $145,000/year for his elected office. Does he earn it? Does keeping a checking account open to receive monthly direct deposits count as "earning" his pay?

Next time you see Keith, if you do see him somewhere besides Cape Coral or Minocqua, be sure to call him "Seldom Seen".

Just so you'll know... any attention to Keith Nygren would have been over on November 2, 2010, except for two things:

1. his dumb antic in the Woodstock Jewel-Osco parking lot on September 17, 2009; and
2.  his snubs in the polling room at early-voting, in the Woodstock Walgreens and at the Harvard Business Expo.

It's a really small-minded person who won't respond to a friendly greeting. If Seldom Seen wants to make it personal, that's okay with me.