Monday, August 28, 2006
I’m constantly trying to prove that this entire universe is somehow conspiring against me. More evidence was added to my case Friday night when I attended my first high school football game of the 2006 season, a 5-A match-up between perennial powerhouse Jordan and perennial loser Layton.
Since I work for an Ogden-area newspaper that covers only local schools (in Weber, Davis, Morgan, Box Elder, and Cache counties), getting assigned a game like Jordan/Layton is an immediate insult to my journalistic skills, since I’m really only there to cover one school, the local team, Layton. Compare this to a game like the highly-coveted Northridge/Roy match-up, which appeared on the front page of the sports section along with color photos and a jump to page 2-C. Both teams are local, which means fans from both schools will read the story, contact the editor with positive comments, and boost the writer even further in his career while scrubs like me languish in the background, writing articles destined to be buried somewhere next to the obituaries. Pity me.
Anyway, I was determined to make the most of what I had, a horribly mismatched game where Layton didn’t have a hooker’s chance in heaven. I told a friend that the final score would be 42-6 in favor of Jordan. The final score ended up being 35-0 with the mighty Beetdiggers on top, nearly proving me a prophet.
Off the subject for a moment, you’d think that having a mascot like the Beetdiggers would be the weirdest in the state, but no, Utah is full of weirder ones. How about the Carbon Dinos? American Fork Cavemen? Davis Darts? Spanish Fork Dons? Take Meridian High School, whose mascot is the Mongoose, a small, Asiatic, cat-like creature most famous for its unique ability to kill snakes and its prominent role in the book Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. And Delta High School, located 75 miles from any other inhabitable settlement, has the Rabbit as its mascot, the only high school in the country (literally, it’s the only one) dumb enough to name an animal as weak, stupid, and horny as the rabbit as its symbol of power. The name isn’t weird exactly, just illogical. I actually saw a program on ESPN once which showcased bizarre sports mascots, and Delta High was featured. I’ve been there once, and since it’s so far from anything else, the community pours all its money into the school, resulting in the finest athletic facilities in the state. Not bad for the lowly Rabbits. As a side note, Long Beach Polytechnic High School in Long Beach, California has the Jack Rabbit as its mascot, but that’s a little more manly. The school is the alma mater of actress Cameron Diaz, rapper Snoop Dogg (‘fo shizzle), musician Lita Ford, and lesbian tennis player Billie Jean King, most famous for being the world’s first obese tennis star and for defeating Bobby Riggs in 1973’s Battle of the Sexes tennis match, a feminist statement that metaphorically castrated males everywhere. Thank goodness I wasn’t alive yet.
Anyway, back to my story. So what do you do when the team you’re supposed to cover fails to score a single point and gets blown away by an obviously superior team? That’s simple. You check out the cheerleaders for two hours, wish you were young enough to date them without looking like a perv, get a few quotes from the embarrassed coach, and write an article so scathing that the team will think twice about losing again. That’ll teach ‘em!
After two hours of staring at bleached hair, fake n’ bake legs and tight little bums in short skirts, I went to interview the coach. Because I’m one of the laziest creatures on the planet, I have an expensive little digital recorder to capture every word, so I can easily transcribe the interview later, if anything is worth including. Compare that to the journalists who scribble furiously while someone is talking, somehow getting an intelligible quote written, or making one up from the few words they can read.
So I turned on my recorder and asked my first question. But something was wrong. Even though I’d put in fresh batteries only a few hours previous, my recorder was drained of power, showing me the annoying little blinking battery symbol. I sighed, put my expensive (yet worthless, now) gizmo away and told the coach to talk slowly. He was pissed from the loss and spouted off the usual coaching clichés while I tried to write as much as I could, getting a few legible words down. When my hand went numb from writing, I told him I had enough.
If getting assigned the crappy game and having my recorder fail me wasn’t enough, I-15 was backed up for about seven miles that night, forcing me to write my story in the car with the dome light on while navigating the stop-and-go traffic and screaming every naughty word I could think of. I usually have a 10:30 pm deadline, but I called from my car, explained my situation, and got a little extension. I finally got to the office at 10:47 (a eight mile drive took over an hour!) wrote my story using whatever quotes I could salvage, and turned it in. Whew!
Miraculously, there was only one grammatical mistake in my article, a plural possessive that I sloppily notated as a singular because of my rush.
Since I work for an Ogden-area newspaper that covers only local schools (in Weber, Davis, Morgan, Box Elder, and Cache counties), getting assigned a game like Jordan/Layton is an immediate insult to my journalistic skills, since I’m really only there to cover one school, the local team, Layton. Compare this to a game like the highly-coveted Northridge/Roy match-up, which appeared on the front page of the sports section along with color photos and a jump to page 2-C. Both teams are local, which means fans from both schools will read the story, contact the editor with positive comments, and boost the writer even further in his career while scrubs like me languish in the background, writing articles destined to be buried somewhere next to the obituaries. Pity me.
Anyway, I was determined to make the most of what I had, a horribly mismatched game where Layton didn’t have a hooker’s chance in heaven. I told a friend that the final score would be 42-6 in favor of Jordan. The final score ended up being 35-0 with the mighty Beetdiggers on top, nearly proving me a prophet.
Off the subject for a moment, you’d think that having a mascot like the Beetdiggers would be the weirdest in the state, but no, Utah is full of weirder ones. How about the Carbon Dinos? American Fork Cavemen? Davis Darts? Spanish Fork Dons? Take Meridian High School, whose mascot is the Mongoose, a small, Asiatic, cat-like creature most famous for its unique ability to kill snakes and its prominent role in the book Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. And Delta High School, located 75 miles from any other inhabitable settlement, has the Rabbit as its mascot, the only high school in the country (literally, it’s the only one) dumb enough to name an animal as weak, stupid, and horny as the rabbit as its symbol of power. The name isn’t weird exactly, just illogical. I actually saw a program on ESPN once which showcased bizarre sports mascots, and Delta High was featured. I’ve been there once, and since it’s so far from anything else, the community pours all its money into the school, resulting in the finest athletic facilities in the state. Not bad for the lowly Rabbits. As a side note, Long Beach Polytechnic High School in Long Beach, California has the Jack Rabbit as its mascot, but that’s a little more manly. The school is the alma mater of actress Cameron Diaz, rapper Snoop Dogg (‘fo shizzle), musician Lita Ford, and lesbian tennis player Billie Jean King, most famous for being the world’s first obese tennis star and for defeating Bobby Riggs in 1973’s Battle of the Sexes tennis match, a feminist statement that metaphorically castrated males everywhere. Thank goodness I wasn’t alive yet.
Anyway, back to my story. So what do you do when the team you’re supposed to cover fails to score a single point and gets blown away by an obviously superior team? That’s simple. You check out the cheerleaders for two hours, wish you were young enough to date them without looking like a perv, get a few quotes from the embarrassed coach, and write an article so scathing that the team will think twice about losing again. That’ll teach ‘em!
After two hours of staring at bleached hair, fake n’ bake legs and tight little bums in short skirts, I went to interview the coach. Because I’m one of the laziest creatures on the planet, I have an expensive little digital recorder to capture every word, so I can easily transcribe the interview later, if anything is worth including. Compare that to the journalists who scribble furiously while someone is talking, somehow getting an intelligible quote written, or making one up from the few words they can read.
So I turned on my recorder and asked my first question. But something was wrong. Even though I’d put in fresh batteries only a few hours previous, my recorder was drained of power, showing me the annoying little blinking battery symbol. I sighed, put my expensive (yet worthless, now) gizmo away and told the coach to talk slowly. He was pissed from the loss and spouted off the usual coaching clichés while I tried to write as much as I could, getting a few legible words down. When my hand went numb from writing, I told him I had enough.
If getting assigned the crappy game and having my recorder fail me wasn’t enough, I-15 was backed up for about seven miles that night, forcing me to write my story in the car with the dome light on while navigating the stop-and-go traffic and screaming every naughty word I could think of. I usually have a 10:30 pm deadline, but I called from my car, explained my situation, and got a little extension. I finally got to the office at 10:47 (a eight mile drive took over an hour!) wrote my story using whatever quotes I could salvage, and turned it in. Whew!
Miraculously, there was only one grammatical mistake in my article, a plural possessive that I sloppily notated as a singular because of my rush.
Grid Picks Update
I correctly picked nine out of twelve games last week, which probably isn't good enough for a T-shirt, but isn't bad, considering the tricky games that were played. I correctly picked Davis to upset Brighton, the second-best team in the state, even though it took overtime to secure the win. If anyone beat me, let me know your secret, because 9-for-12 just isn't good enough.
