From journalistic-lapse reports

An ice-sculpting demonstration set for last Saturday — Feb. 7, according to the calendar archives, to be exact — was postponed, due to milder-than-expected winter weather.

“No human being could be expected to carve a masterpiece in that climate,” said featured ice-carver Michael Tanner, third-grade art teacher at Bass Lake Elementary.

Non-snow date is Feb. 28.

The demonstration, scheduled to take place at Gerald Fjord on Bass Lake, was called off just prior to start time, the Beacon learned 45 hours later, after the reporter assigned to the event overslept that day, then came down with the flu and was bedridden until late Monday.

“I wondered why the hell nobody filed a story on that,” said a disgruntled Jackson Frolic, senior editor at the Beacon, in a brief Twitter statement. “Did I forget to pay somebody around here?” he said in a separate tweet.

A bonus feature of the mid-winter classic, the inaugural “Ice-carving Bonus-Event Snowmobile Pull,” has been canceled, and may never be attempted again, according to event sponsor Bass Lake Fish ’n’ Boat.

“Think about it,” said Fish ’n’ Boat owner Shane McVanDerKamp. “Would you bother?”