Can a Creepy Garden Gnome Launch the Giants to Victory?
The NY Daily News brings us the touching tale of a Brooklyn woman and her lucky garden gnome. Ever since Jennifer Pernice received the gag gift — it's your standard garden gnome in a Giants jersey — "The Giants have been doing pretty good." Look, either Pernice is the fun kind of crazy, or that gnome is actual magic. Either way it makes for a great story.
Naturally, Pernice is very protective of her little friend and refuses to let anyone else touch him. (The Daily News is reasonable enough to define this as a "fanatical superstition.") And the description of how she actually handles the gnome is — well, it makes less sense to me than football, and that's pretty significant.
Pernice can be seen every Sunday cradling the gnome she calls Ganomio at the Salty Dog Bar in Brooklyn, hoisting him up to the TV during crucial plays.
If the Giants go on to win the Superbowl, this tale is begging for a cinematic adaptation. My first instinct was Pixar, because of the cute gnome factor, but now I'm thinking something darker. While Pernice may not think Ganomio is creepy, I'm appropriately horrified by the little monster. There's also something chilling about her assertion that, "He's looking over Eli's shoulder." Somebody ask Eli Manning if he feels like he's being followed.
Whether it ends up adapted as a gay romp or a Leprechaun-esque thriller, the real protagonist of this story is Jennifer's sister Lauren, who spent $35 on a garden gnome. In this economy? I guess that's a small price to pay for victory.