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| Winter Madness |  |
Or at least my little area of Central Oregon has. I suppose it all started with the Civil War. Not that one. The REAL one. You know: the football game between the University of Oregon and Oregon State University. Ducks vs. Beavs. The War of the Roses. This was the first time the game meant so much. The winner would go on to The Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Californee and the stakes simply could not have been higher. As near as I can tell, it is a rare time when the state of Oregon has two good college football teams. Seeing as how I am an alumni from San Diego State University, I have no idea what that would look like. The Aztecs have rarely been known as a powerhouse of any kind. The school has produced its share of outstanding individual athletes but the teams, well, the teams have been lacking. Which is fine. Our lone achievement on the college scene has been the ability to rearrange our initials to spell SUDS. We are ever so proud of that. Most of the time here, no one really cares which school one supports. As you can imagine, some households have family members that attended different schools. We call those families platypuses and they are known individually as A House Divided. In general though, we cheer every time an Oregon school gets national recognition and we clap extra hard when they pronounce our state correctly. It’s Or-eh-gun. Not Or-EE-Gone which sounds like a braying donkey. If you pronounce Oregon like that, we laugh at you, sometimes directly into your face. It’s one of our rare forms of entertainment so forgive us. Otherwise, we’re pretty nice. But in the days leading up to the big game, the horns came out, so to speak. Motor vehicles of ALL types were the primary platform used for expression and they were decorated with great care. Depending upon which side you wished to win, the opposition was shown in various displays of extreme violence. It was not uncommon for supporters of the animal-rights organization, PETA, to be seen fainting dead away upon the sight. Personally, I have never seen such vengeance wrought upon so many beavers and ducks in my life. These poor feathered and furry creatures were stabbed, hung, guillotined, shot, barbequed and mutilated beyond recognition. It was a tad disturbing to this animal lover. After all, the Aztecs just died of smallpox and we didn’t really hang around long to bother anyone after that. In the downtown Christmas parade, yes; the real, live Christmas parade, someone drove a hearse, yes; a real, live hearse, decorated in the green and yellow Duck colors and hanging out of the back was a coffin, yes; a real, live coffin, covered in the black and orange Beaver colors with a Oregon State University banner draped on it. Taste was not included. Also, in the Christmas parade was all three local high school marching bands but by far, the best of the three was the one with my daughter in it playing her flute and wearing her uniform and hat with the silver plume on top. I know that little tidbit has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with college football, weather or local madness but I was sure you would want to know. I know I did. But, as the record shows, the Ducks won the game so the University of Oregon will be in the Rose Bowl against Ohio State University. It will be the Ducks vs. the Bucks. Oregon State will be in the Las Vegas Bowl against BYU. However, apparently that is not the way God intended. Who knew God was a Beavers fan? How else do you explain the weather in Central Oregon over the last 24 hours? Yesterday, we were told to expect cold temperatures and a few snow flurries. It never got over 16 degrees and around 1:00 in the afternoon, we started shoveling our second foot of snow. I am SO not kidding. If that wasn’t enough, today, this morning, as I write this, the outdoor temperature at my house is four. Fahrenheit. F-O-U-R. The number after three and before five. If there were any ducks or beavers in my front yard, they were be frozen stiff. Any Aztecs who happened to be strolling by would be begging for smallpox. AND, there’s more. If you can believe it and my kids simply CANNOT; school is NOT cancelled. Neither is work. Beloved Spouse left about an hour ago to begin a four-hour drive to Portland for a business meeting. He’s going over Mt. Hood where the current temperature is -7. We grow ‘em tough here. Except for my two exceptionally weenie dogs who are mourning the lawn because I told them it went to live with Jesus.
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