As we begin to look ahead with terror anticipation to the start of a new year, it is always horrifying pleasant to reflect back on the major events that shaped the year that is ending, and what a year 2017 was for Vermont!

The year started, as years often do, with January. Everything was going well for the first 19 days of the year, but then, on January 20th, Donald Trump became president and activated his “Stupidity Ray,” causing all Democrats and Republicans to become permanently unreasonable. His inauguration was attended by the entire state of Vermont, making it the least attended inauguration in history. Trump retaliated against the state for being so small by declaring that all Vermonters should lose their coats and be thrown out into the cold, which caused massive global protests the following day.

Unfortunately these protests caused the return of February, which was shortened by one day to 28 days since no one enjoyed it all that much back in 2016. Vermonters were angry when Bill Sister opened a bar in Winooski named Mr. Sister, claiming that the name was a derogatory slur. Sister claimed that he just just named it after himself, but got no sympathy from anyone except for Colchester resident Dick Wiener, who totally understood. The month also saw a weekend cannoli shop open in downtown Chester, but the owner was unable to drum up any controversy and chose to only sell delicious pastries, disappointing conspiracy theorists everywhere.

In March the rest of the country welcomed in the spring, while Vermont prepared for the second half of winter to begin. Town meeting day saw many towns struggling to decide how to greet their new ACT 46 educational overlords that they met last November. Many districts had merged together to better fight back against the state while others had chosen to go it alone as plucky rebel loners refusing to bend to the system. Of course it was hard to wage war during the traditional mid-March blizzard, especially with so few tauntauns available. A few tauntauns had been scheduled to speak at Middlebury college, but were booed heavily by the students and eventually returned to the wild.

April was probably full of interesting news stories, but nobody in Vermont noticed because they were all at Starbucks trying to drink unicorn-themed beverages. Fox news host Bill O’Reilly attempted to distract us all from the beverages, which were 87% sugar, 12% dye, and 1% “substances previously unknown on earth,” but this angered everyone and he was immediately fired. In fact, nobody came out of their Starbucks-induced comas until…

finally, in May, Vermont news was saved forever by the creation of The Winooski, a locally sourced organic satire site that finally gave Vermonters what they really wanted, or so we assume. The new site was able to report on all of the best news items, such as South Burlington’s team name changes, the deterioration of Route 11, and Middlebury’s road construction projects. In national news, the White House kicked off its annual internet scavenger hunt with its most obscure clue yet: covfefe.

As winter drew to a close here in the Green Mountain State we welcomed the month of June by fixing up our nude beaches, and eating creemees. Governor Scott made promises to fix the educational system by providing unlimited teacher strikes, while Burlington approved some major development and Jay Peak pretended to approve some major development. And most importantly, as The Winooski’s popularity grew, it added a weekly cartoon called Syrup & Cows, providing meaningful Vermont entertainment and beating out all other local comics despite the creator being in fourth grade. Although hands down the biggest story of the year was Vermont’s controversial travel ban that, despite being entirely made-up, angered thousands of people.

The second half of Vermont’s year kicked off with 31 days of July, as the heroic astronomers at the Stellafane convention in Springfield, VT successfully rescued all of the kidnapped slave children that were being held on Mars by the liberal media. Major flooding continued to plague the state, although Thetford was re-discovered fairly quickly and salvaged from the bottom of the Connecticut river. In entertainment news, the penultimate season of Game of Thrones premiered and featured many scenes and themes featuring Vermont, causing the show to attain more success than ever before. The month eventually came to a close as Vermonters complained loudly about the lack of presidential portraits that were never received.

As if July wasn’t long enough, August also decided to take 31 days for itself, which it needed in order to contain all of the news that was going on. News like the exciting look we got into the high finance world of Vermont town clerks, or the 67th anniversary of the 100th birthday of the Deerfield Valley Farmer’s Day Fair. And the whole world and nation was shocked when the town of Richford, VT seceded from the United States and established itself as the new nation of South Canada. Yes, between the stabbings in downtown Burlington and the invading Nazis, it seemed as though nobody wanted to be in Vermont anymore. Luckily we closed out the month with a distracting eclipse that got everyone in a good mood and no longer concerned about the civil war statues being pulled down or the devastating hurricanes.

After such a worrying month, Quebec filed for custody of Vermont in September, but nothing came of it. The state government responded by sending out thousands of threatening and aggressive tax letters, hoping to make people feel more secure. When this didn’t work, Gov. Scott followed through on his earlier promise and kicked off a season of teacher strikes that were intended to improve education. There was also an increase in bridge funding that catered to Vermont’s growing troll population. This imbalance in funding set off Vermont’s cows, who went on strike until their own finances were in better order. If only they had taken a page from Burlington Telecom, who solved all of their problems when they sold the company to Jared Kushner.

Not to be outdone by Kushner, Vice President Pence traveled to Vermont in October looking for a protest to protest but, having missed the foliage strike, was unsuccessful. As the month progressed, wave after wave of women stepped forward to accuse rich and powerful men of harassing and assaulting them, the details of which surprised approximately one American, plus or minus one American. Meanwhile, Vermont businesses spent the month trying to become more haunted. And as the tenth month rolled to a close, our first winter wind storm rolled in and our first trucker rolled to an unplanned stop up at Smuggler’s Notch.

Business continued to be chaotic in November. Costco was banned from selling gasoline from its new pumps, and the sale of VT Yankee was delayed and derailed yet again. Election day was upon us once again, and Democrats swept the country on a pro-Vermont platform, or perhaps Americans were just upset about the continuing parade of weird appointments coming from the White House. UVM was one of the few businesses not in financial trouble after balancing their budget with a few minor cuts, and retail stores started prepping for Black Thursday/Shopsgiving. The impending Christmas season was exactly what the Burlington City Council was looking for as a distraction so that they could sell Burlington Telecom to a couple of shady guys in a hallway with a contract written on a post-it note. Burlington had regained control of BTC when Jared Kushner declared immediate bankruptcy after purchasing the company back in September.

December started off with a bang as North Korea fired a nuclear missile directly at Vermont (they missed), and Congress passed a new tax bill that nobody had read, including the people who had written it. Speaking of bangs, an explosion rocked the UTC plant in Vergennes and South Canada was blamed. Although we now have a new suspect, nobody is sure which country is to blame, so we will probably all just forget about it. The new Star Wars movie also came out with a bang, but careers were ruined over spoilers. DO NOT SPOIL STAR WARS.

And now the year is winding down. Tourists are arriving by the crash-load, the Christmas concerts are ending, and the last minute gifts are being intercepted by the police. 2018 will be here any second and, if this year is any indication, it will be full of things that make no sense that will be decided by people that make no sense. And we here at The Winooski will be here to report it all for you. And when the news is not good enough, dear readers, we’ll fix it up for you. See you next year!