Just because they may be your neighbors, Olympians in bright-colored lycra racing around on the snow are an intimidating bunch. The skate ski crowd is almost neck and neck with the road bikers for having the most homogenous matching outfits and questionable-sponsorship wear. So, it's no wonder that here in Central Oregon especially, Nordic racing has a larger-than-life aurora surrounding it that may be off-putting to the “citizen skiers” who are considering getting out there just for the fun of it.
Outside
Posted inOutside
Sorry, Ducks: But if it's any comfort, I'm pretty sure Cam Newton is a cyborg
Auburn beat Oregon in the BCS National Championship game because Cam Newton is a Cyborg.
You feel that? It's not a winter chill. That's the sensation of disappointment – deep, burning, painful disappointment – flooding through the fields, mountains, rivers and city streets of Oregon. The Ducks didn't win the BCS Championship and thus the vast conspiracy to keep the Coaches Trophy in the hands of SEC teams and their swollen-bellied boosters remains intact. But barely.
Posted inOutside
All Good Things: Wasting another perfectly good New Year's Eve on the river
A New Year’s Eve on the Deschutes River.
Under the best of conditions, steelhead fishing in Central Oregon, or anywhere for that matter, is an endurance test in which an angler pursues for days, weeks and even months at a time, a creature that is blissfully unaware of its pursuers existence – that is until that one fleeting and magical second when a fish moves invisibly from its holding lie, driven by some instinct that even the most dedicated angler can only begin to understand, and grabs your fly with a take that can be as sudden and violent as a slap on the face or as a subtle as a whisper in your ear.
Posted inOutside
Take Back the Power: The wind turbines story that the industry doesn't want you to hear
Wind turbines are killing more birds than you might think.
No matter what you think about individual wind generators, or so-called, “wind farms,” one overwhelming fact cannot be denied: they’re all bad news for wildlife, especially birds and bats.
Yes, the original idea was a good one: cheap electricity from a renewable resource and a way to generate power while weaning us from fossil fuels. But in the final analysis, all that wind coming from government agencies – and the industry – about how much we need the power, and how little the industry is destroying wildlife populations, is a bunch of hot air. The bottom line now is profit for the investors, not cheap power or concern over wildlife.
Posted inOutside
A Celebration of Sub-Mediocrity: The Seahawks are proudly the worst team ever to make the NFL playoffs
The Seahawks are in the NFL playoffs, even though they’re pretty awful.
If you're a football fan from Seattle, Tacoma, Spokane, Sedro Wooley or, actually, anywhere in the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho or Alaska that constitute the Seahawk Nation*, you stood in front of your television on Sunday night and realized that the miserable season you'd endured with your Seattle Seahawks wasn't over. In fact, you celebrated the team's NFC West championship. Which means they're in the playoffs. And get to play a home game. With a 7-9 record.
Posted inOutside
What a Weird, Weird 2010: Ten ridiculous moments from the year in sports
1. I'm Lebron, Bitches!
“Dear people of Earth, I am Lebron James and you're all going to stop what you're doing in the middle of summer and endure an anticlimactic hour of television in which I'll disappoint a bunch of kids.
Posted inOutside
Do Your Homework: A Prerequisite before heading into the backcountry
This weekend I learned how to find and dig someone out of an avalanche while backcountry skiing. This is something I hope to never, ever have to do in real life.
Posted inOutside
A Cool Yule: Keeping the holiday spirit alive outside
During his 19 years as director of Mt. Bachelor's Nordic Center, Bob Mathews strove to keep things festive around the holidays. That meant an employee dressed in a full Santa suit skiing around the tracks handing out candy to skiers and the instructors giving lessons while sporting elf hats, ears and tunics.
Posted inOutside
Eating Away the Winter Blahs: What happens when hawks eat other birds
Winter is a tough time for many forms of wildlife. Every day, mule deer, for example, must dig out their winter fare of bitterbrush and tiny plants buried in snow. They also must have thermal cover every night to ward off those nighttime temperatures that can sometimes plummet to below zero.
Similarly, there is a group of hawks that have it tough: the accipiters, otherwise known as “bird hawks.” True, like most birds in our latitudes, their downy underwear keeps them warm, and their winter food: small birds – flocking together in winter for protection, food and warmth – are dependable prey, but let’s not forget Darwin’s theories about how animals adapt to change.
Posted inOutside
Holiday Bowling: If you don't watch college football games this Christmas, Santa is gonna be pissed
Guess what, kids? If you don't watch all the college football bowl games during the Christmas week/weekend, Santa knows, because he has an exclusive deal with ESPN that allows him to look back at you through your television set. And if Santa finds out you skipped, say, the Little Caesars Bowl because you thought it was something your cousin dreamed up when he was super high, he'll make sure you get nothing for Christmas. You'll also be forced to watch nothing but NASCAR until next year. Sorry. Them's the rules.
In the hopes of keeping you from enduring a Santa-enforced year of motor sports, (The guy can be a dick sometimes. Especially when he's been drinking, which is pretty much every night since the elves unionized over the summer.) here are some pointers to bring you up to speed on all the bowl games you better be watching this weekend.
