#Apex In Cowboy Gear
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shininwadacat · 1 year ago
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didn't know we could put apex in clothes but put him in a stereotypical cowboy getup
Yes, we can dress the squid!
Anyways, Apex has now been dressed in Stereotypical Cowboy Gear!
Thank you Anonymous User for submitting this request!
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Wanna dress the squid in random clothing? Just take a trip throw the Milky way, to my Profile to find the Ask Box!
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doctors-star · 3 years ago
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“Yeah, I can see how hiding behind a rock is a much better strategy.”
and
“At least you’ll die doing what you love; Walking into danger.”
for the cowboys
“What’cha doin’?”
Tommy tilts his head back against the rock and looks up at the intruder. Once identified against the bright glare of the sun haloing him, Tommy reaches up and hauls on Johnny’s shirt until he too crumples and settles in the shade at Tommy’s side. “Hidin’,” he says, pressing a finger to his lips. “Sheriff's out huntin’ me, on account of how I pinched the paperweight from off of his desk.” He shifts and fidgets the fine glass hemisphere out of his pocket to show Johnny the chased leaves circling the edge and the cut lines along the top like a whisky decanter.
Johnny makes suitably impressed noises, leaning in so close that his hair brushes Tommy’s over the prize. “Dang,” he whistles in admiration, pressing his fingertip to an intersection of grooves hard enough to make it go white and bloodless, then pulling away to gaze at the lines as they slowly fade. “He’ll be hoppin’ mad. Your aunt’ll kill you,” he says, sounding slightly awed, and Tommy preens under the rightful worship.
Then remembers himself, and winces. Kill doesn’t cover it - she’ll have his hide, and then keep him locked in the house for weeks until she’s satisfied he’s learned something from it. He won’t see Johnny, either, except through the window in the short intervals before Aunt June notices and strides out with a broom to send the other boy skittering away like a stray cat. “Well,” he says sensibly, “that’s why I’m not home.”
Johnny nods seriously, kicking his legs out in front of him. He’s younger than Tommy, but shooting up faster; his new grown-boy trousers are already a good four inches higher than his ankles, and his shirts don’t fit as well as Tommy’s, and he hasn’t got any shoes in summertime, on account of how his mother’s given up on him until he’s really stopped growing - or so she had said when rounding up her son and stopping to have a quick cup of tea and a chat with Aunt June, which had inevitably turned into an hour of commiserating over having boys of their age to manage. Tommy turns his gaze on his own turn-ups, and decides that he doesn’t really mind being shorter if it means his clothes will fit him properly, and he can turn himself out presentably.
“Yeah,” Johnny says, “I can see how hidin’ behind a rock is a much better strategy.”
Tommy nods, pleased with himself and his prize. Which is, of course, when a voice sounds out across the narrow desert path. It is his Aunt June. She is, indeed, hopping mad. “Thomas Morrin, you come out here right now and account your actions to me!”
Tommy and Johnny spring to their feet entirely on nervous instinct, staring back towards town where Aunt June is striding out in their direction. The paperweight slips in his sweaty palm, but he can’t seem to put it down - or move, or anything, frozen in panic. I’m only twelve, his hindbrain squeaks unhelpfully. I’m too young to be put in jail, or skinned by Aunt June. I can’t die - Johnny and me were going to go swimming in the creek tomorrow.
He turns to Johnny - or more accurately, where Johnny had been, for Johnny is already several paces away to the northwest and the grasslands, and the creek. He turns back and offers Tommy an exhilarated, wild grin and holds his hand out. “Come on!” he hollers, dancing backwards on bare, dirty toes and gesturing for Tommy to follow. “We can make it!”
Tommy glances back at his aunt, and reckons he’ll take his chances. Who knows - maybe they’ll make it over the river, and Tommy can have one last swim before his inevitable incarceration for aeons, millennia, or at least a week.
--
Tommy is just gearing up to run when a voice cuts through his focus. “I’m terrible sorry, but could y’all just run through the plan for me one more time? I’m sure it’ll all make sense when you do.”
He relaxes out of his stance, catching Johnny opposite him likewise straightening and unlacing his fingers from the stirrup he’d made of them. They both turn hesitantly to their unexpected audience: it doesn’t sound like Noel is sure the plan will make sense. Don’t look like it either, with her eyebrow cocked sternly in their direction and one arm crossed over her waist to prop up the delicate fingers tapping her jawbone. Tommy resists the urge to doff his hat and shuffle his feet, like a badly-behaved schoolchild with a broken slate. “Well ma’am,” he says instead, “Johnny here is going to give me a lift. This should enable me to reach the porch roof, from where I shall climb onto the roof proper without any trouble.”
Noel’s fingers flick out to point at the roof apex instead. “In order to rescue the cat,” she says flatly.
Johnny puffs up a little, almost offended. “It’s a kitten,” he corrects. And it is - tiny and grey and mewling pitifully as it clings to the shingles. It’s the sorriest thing Tommy ever saw. It must be rescued.
Noel waves this triviality away easily. “The animal, which got there under its own steam and can doubtless return in the same way, I understand. And how will you get down, Mr Morrin?”
Tommy and Johnny frown at the roof. It doesn’t look that high. “I’ll be alright, ma’am.”
“Oh, alright,” Noel says easily. “At least you’ll die doin’ what you love: runnin’ headfirst straight into danger. Mr Williams,” she calls, ignoring how Johnny and Tommy both inflate in irritation at this slight on their wisdom and skills and instead waving her hand delicately to attract Will’s attention as he emerges from the home of one of his patients down the street, “won’t you come stand by me, just in case?”
Will’s dark eyes flick over the entire scene. “Oh dear,” he says conversationally, wandering over to stand at Noel’s side. She slides her spare hand into the crook of his elbow easily, tucking him into her side, and Tommy wonders all over again just what those two think of each other, ‘cause he ain’t got a damn idea. Then Will gestures invitingly at Tommy and Johnny. “Well, don’t stop on our account.”
Johnny glances sideways at Tommy. “But you reckon we oughtta stop,” he says, nearly a question.
Will shrugs and Noel looks like she’s chewing down a smile. Will’s eyes keep glancing off to one side, but that ain’t really unusual with him so Tommy doesn’t really notice it - not properly. “We wouldn’t dream of tellin’ y’all what to do,” Noel says sweetly.
The implication is clear. Unfortunately, Tommy is incapable of reading this as anything but a challenge, so he turns back to Johnny with new determination. Johnny braces his hands and Tommy bends down for maximum speed as he runs straight for Johnny, plants his boot in his palms, and is launched straight upwards and onto the porch roof. From there, without pausing for thought, he scrambles up the wall by wedging his toes in the gaps between the planks cladding the building, and doesn’t stop until he is crouched, cat-like, on the shingles.
Then he looks around him. Speaking of cat-like, there appears to be a distinct absence of kitten on the roof now.
He looks back down. Noel and Will are grinning without restraint, now, and Johnny is looking a little uncomfortable. Which is reasonable, as there is a small grey kitten clawing its way up his leg, and it is definitely not on the roof. It’s purring quite loudly, too, and Johnny’s finger keeps stretching out and stroking guiltily over its head.
“Did I scare it down?” Tommy asks, in a last-ditch effort to regain at least a little dignity in victory from this.
Will shuts one eye as he squints and shakes his head. “Naw,” Noel informs him happily, “it came down when the doc showed up.”
Tommy looks at the floor. It suddenly looks an awful long way away. “Johnny,” he says quietly, “how am I gonna get down?”
Johnny frowns, assessing the porch beams, the shingles, the siding. He tilts his head as he looks for routes and footholds and anything to make the return easier. He looks just like he had when they were kids and getting in and out of buildings without permission and fairly often with handfuls of sweets and brown sugar in their pockets, and with the maximum of mischief. They’d got into a lot of scrapes together, him and Johnny, but they’d survived ‘em all so far - Johnny would get him down.
Johnny squints up at him, shading his eyes under one hand. “Carefully?” he suggests.
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popculturebuffet · 4 years ago
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Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck Restrospective: The Raider of the Copper Hill! “You Got Rich Son”
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Hello all you happy people! And welcome back to my retrospective of the Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck! It’s been far too long, almost three months since we last checked in with Scrooge and frankly I feel i’ve been spacing these entries out too much for this one and for the retrospectives that aren’t paid for in general. So expect at least one McDuck adventure a month till I finish, possibly two when I can swing it like this month. 
Now i’m done beating myself up, when we last left off a younger more naive, more optimistic and less experienced Scooge took up a career as a cowboy for  Cattle Baron, gained his first sidekick in the form of his Horse Hortense, and took out some cattle thieves with the help of Teddy Fucking Roosevelt. 
This chapter marks the end of the story’s first act. The first act is about a younger and far nicer Scrooge: still onrey and still a cheapskate, but still a good kid and far more outwardly friendly and welcoming, a far cry from the bitter untrusting man we come to know. This chapter is one of the reasons why, as Scrooge learns a hard lesson about wealth and success, the sacrifices one needs to make for family and about sticking your hand in a lightbulb while it’s plugged in. So join me under the cut as Scrooge meets another valuable mentor, one of his greatest enemies, and about 50 feet of barbed wire. 
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We begin with the end of Scrooge’s time as a ranch hand and cowpunch. With homesteaders moving in and dividing up the land, Murdo simply dosen’t have the space for cattle baroning anymore and has to let Scrooge go and head back to texas. We do get a great bit of Scrooge wrapped in barbed wire, having gone to cut some down so Murdo could move the herd out. 
So with his Job done and parting on good terms with his old boss, Scrooge sets up his own homestead on some land near the Anaconda Silver Mine, trying to make it as a prospector, starting on the path that would eventually lead him to riches.. in about a decade and a half.
 So Scrooge bemoans his rotten luck over Dinner with a stranger, Marcus Daly owner of said mine... who just.. randomly sat down to have dinner with a 17 year old. 
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Marcus belays his own woes: While Scrooge has failed at what he tried to do, having gotten into both steamboating and cattle punching too late to go anywhere with either, Daly has a silver mine that’s full of copper: decent amoutns of it but still not what his investors wanted. 
Both however find their fortunes reverse in an instant in the weirdest way possible. The light goes out at their table and Scrooge tries to adjust it only to electcute himself. To his shock...
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He finds out it’s running on electricty, which is starting to become widespread.. and requires vast amounts of copper wiring. Scrooge is back in the game but finds trouble getting equipment as the local seller naturally is a jackass who jacks up the price. Scrooge instead sells the gold teeth his dad gave him to the nearest gentleman after talking him into it. . And i’ts not even the weirdest transaction i’ve seen this week. 
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For the record those weird things are the guy on the left’s skinflakes, his power is to make naked golems of himself out of his dandruff and skin flakes and what have you, while the guy on the right is paying for a mutant with a star for a head. So yeah a scottish cowboy selling his ancestor’s dentures to pay for mining gear is refelshingly tame after all of this. 
So we get the comic equivleant of a montage as Scrooge starts his work at prospecting, making a portable homesteader shack as a miner owns any land he lives on, and moving around to try and find it, but he runs into a problem: with his last two careers he had mentors to help him learn what to do: Pothole taught him riverboating and Murdo helped him learn to ride the trails. Here he has no one and while you can self teach a lot of things prospecting isn’t one of them. 
He end sup finding one though as a rich gentleman asking about the mine happens to wander by: Howard D. Rockerduck. If that names sounds familiar it should as he’s indeed the father of exactly who your thinking of and we meet a young 10 or so year old john who asks him to stop dealing with a grubby workman. We also find out whose responsible for him turning out ot be such a piece of work as his mother’s response to his father telling him “I used to be a grubby workman is well... word’s cant’ do this amount of classist bulslhit justice. 
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Seriously his unnamed wife is so odious it hurts. And how the fuck did an honest, kind man like Howard end up with this bitch? It’ sbaffled me every time i’ve read this: did he marry for money? is he a gold digger? go down gold dig get down? Is she just THAT good in bed? Did he just make a horrible mistake one night? Did she lie to him about who she was? Was she replaced by a skrull? I have questions no duck comic has properly explained.. and if they have please tell me.  Also it does tickle me we’re getting a bit with a duck named howard though sadly he wears a top hat instead of a nice little bowler. And if you don’t know who howard the duck is.. shame on you. And if you’ve seen the movie.. my deepest sympathies. 
While Howard laments wanting to horsewhip his son, this was a century ago with change mind you standards were different and also John sucks. Howard crticizes Scrooge’s techqniue after introducing himself, and Scrooge and him get into a bit of a tizzy, with Howard offering to teach him for two cents.. but the hostility quickly desolves hours later as Scrooge realizes Howard was right and he’d been doing things completely wrong and the thrill of hard honest work again has washed away any ego driven competiviness. 
I”ll get more into Howard in a second but he does eventually strike copper, and while the vein is full it’s also thin. But Howard has one final trick and takes Scroogey for an ore test. I tried to find more on this but just found a lot of ways to do it yourself and what not. I”m now really intrigued how they did this and found the content of minerals. I know it’s a dull subject but i’m curious how they did it with the technology of the time. Did they just use acids like I found? If so how’d they get them? I do say this is one of the great qualities of Rosa’s works: he makes you want to learn more about history. I looked up more about TR after the last chapter and now I want to know how the hell metallurgy worked in the late 1800′s. 
We then get an intresting interacton as Scrooge.. warmly greets the townsfolk and vice versa.. yes the same Scrooge who as an adult would be introduced proclaming...
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Is warm, optimistic and wholeheartedly belieives...
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As you can probably tell by Howard’s reaction and what Scrooge becomes.. this story’s all about shattering that notion and is the first of two to shatter the poor kid’s trust in people and make him into the bitter old sod we know. 
The sample comes back 55% positive... which leaves Howard rushing to get Scrooge to a court house. As it turns out there’s an old, very real for the time, mining law called the Law of Apex: whoever owns the land closest to where an ore vein is on the surface owns the whole thing... so legally Scrogoe owns the ENTIRE ANACONDA COPPER MINE, which at this point as detailed in the time skip has gone from struggling to utterly thriving and sucessful. Whoever owns the land at the time the Judge rules it gets the mine.. and Scrooge’s friends, who seconds ago were concerned about him being dragged into court.. are now all scrambling to take his fortune, something Howard dosen’t seem at all suprised about. 
But while this may be a kinder, more naive Scrooge McDuck, it’s still SCROOGE MCDUCK. His response is to cut a nearbye power wire and swing it tarzan style over to hortense and ride her back ahead of the mob... with the electric wire slapping her rear and causing her to go extra fast.. and also quit. So Scrooge stands alone but manages to take out some of the ruffians with his shack while John and the Judge rush to the site. As for Scrooge well... you want to see what a McDuck family beserker rage against an ENTIRE angry mob of opportunistic assholes look like? 
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And this isn’t even the most badass thing Scrooge will do this series. Or even in the next few issues. That’s how awesome this series is: fighting an angry mob SOLO with simply his pure rage and whatever he can grab and throw. And he WINS. He’s exausted and passes out, falling out of the sky on his final opponent.. but he took out what was at the LEAST 50 men, and ONLY passed out because one of them threw dynamite in his out house.. and even THAT didn’t kill him or put him out, simply casuing him to land on said dynamite throwing idiot and wins. 
We find out Rockerduck actually was one of the mine’s owners but helped Scrooge anyway: he has more than enough money and all it’s going to do in the end is go to a greedy brat. Marcus Daly shows up and while he’ll get the law overturned eventually, he still has to shut down while that happens and finds the right officials to bribe. And this is the 1800s... you gotta go by train to do your bribes. You can’t just do that shit over email and hidden bank accounts. Daly offers him 10,000.. but given what Scrooge could earn even before he got his mine back, Scrooge turns it down. 
However this victory is bittersweet as Scrooge warmly greets his friends.. only for one to cuss him out and the other to tell him to get loss. We then get one of my faviorite exchanges in this story.
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This whole Panel is a masterwork. The sheer INNOCENCE on Scrooge’s face, almost looking like Donald, desperately wondering what he did, when as Howard points out.. he did nothing wrong. He simply got successful and they resent him for it. 
This has been a hard paragraph for me to write as I want to tread carefully. People do have good reasons to scorn the rich or celebrtiies sometimes. Some rich people or those in the media are genuinely terrible. Jeff Bezos, Tucker Carlson, Mel Gibson, Louie CK, Joss Whedon and even someone as low on the totem pole as Doug Walker is odious. And of course we all can think of one odious example of rich bastard i’d rather not think of, especially when thinking of John D Rockerduck and what he’l lbecome as an adult that i’m not giving a pleasure of the name drop but came to mind. 
But even for good people becoming succesful puts up a barrier between you and other people: Fans of yours will admire you or write fanfic or what have about you without even knowing you, i’ve been on that side, and some people will hate you just because without valid reason, especially in this day and age. Success breeds resentment and even people you trusted and loved can sometimes turn on you. It’s the double eged sword of achieving your dreams: You get what you wanted but you often loose what you had. 
And it was no diffrent two centuries ago, with Scrooge’s friends only being friendly as long as it suited them, turning on him first to steal his chance at glory and then to scorn him for daring to achieve it. Some people.. are only there for you as long as your not above them. And sometimes you can be happy. Look at Tom Hanks, who has a lovely family and a long and storied career. Or Linkara, a youtuber who has been at this for over a decade, has tons of fans, a loving wife with her own succesful channel, and just recently got contacted by his childhood heroes. You CAN be happy and successful.. it’s just very hard to make it that far. 
One of the central points of life and times is that’s often not the case: You can get what you want but it comes at a cost. And it’s how you pay that price that will determine how happy you are. Another central point intertwined with it is it’s not the journey but the destination, and i’ts how Scrooge takes that journey that ultimately leads him where he ends up good and bad. And we get an all to telling all too foreboding hint in how he takes everyone he knew for at least a year turning on him overnight. 
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When faced with his first real loss on this Journey that wasn’t material.. he dosen’t care. He has his money and riches and that’s enough. And as we’ll see that attitude will cost him greatly. Howard is irate for a moment, hoping he wasn’t wrong in trusting Scrooge.. and indeed, for now, turns out to have placed his faith in the right person as Scrooge gets a telegram: his family needs him. And while he could stay, turn his back on them, and earn MILLIONS.. he tells Howard  to tell the owner he’s taking the deal. For now when given the choice between his family and his fortune, SCrooge will choose them. Sadly.. that won’t hold true forever. 
With this being the end of his time in the story, as he has a still insufferable John buy him a horsewhip for horrific but darkly funny reasons, as John brags about how rich his father is not realizing he’s buying his own whupping tool, i’d like to touch on Howard D Rockerduck and how amazing he is. Rosa managed to pack a throughly interesting, throughly engaging character into only 8 pages. While Rockerduck DID show up earlier in of ducks dimes and destinys, he wasn’t really fleshed out or named and only showed up for one page so still 9 pages total. 
But in those we see a kind and noble man whose easily what Scrooge COULD have been, kind, noble, generous, hardworking and willing to give up money to help people. He’s a good man.. but even he’s seen the sacrifice Money brings. He’s clearly lost friends, lost a sense of peace, and married the wrong Woman, whose poisoned his children into a spoiled brat who will only grown into an even more spoield adult in both continuities.. if raised quite a bit earlier in the 2017 cartoon as he was made scrooge’s contemporary there rather than a child, but semeantics. Point is Howard hismelf isn’t wholly satisfied with his success.. and that’s what he and Scrooge will forever have in common, with Scrooge, likely as a result of meeting the Rockerducks, fearing an indadiquate inheritor and someone squandering what he worked hard for. Though his reasons for not taking up a wife as we’ll see eventually, if outside the main 12 part story but I intend to cover the subchapters in their own time, aren’t entirely motivated by avoiding goldigging but a broken hard and his own stubborness. 
For now though we bid Howard and america adue. Scrooge however for once ends an occupation with less bitterness. Unlike his last two ventures where he made it out with only enough to get to the next one here he made it out ahead: he now has a decent suit, likely bought for him by Howard given he hasn’t cashed the check yet, I know this as it’s a major plot point for next time, 10,000 dollars.. and experince. He may of not gotten all the money he was due on this venture, but he learned more valuable skills and he feels with a land like america, the next opportunity to earn some dough is just waiting for him to get back. And as the chapter ends he muses that maybe the country could use a symbol of this countries boundless opportunity...
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Final Thoughts for the Raider of the Copper Hill:
This chapter is one of my favorites. It’s nicely paced, something Rosa himself admits was often a struggle as he had to cover years at a time, has a wonderful new mentor for Scrooge, and sets up a lot of the tragedy to come in the last act beautifully. It’s a nice closer for our first act, showing Scrooge has come out of his first trip to america wiser, more experinced and more hopeful, but at heart still the same kind and noble kid he left Glasgow as. The next act is about the change of that boy into a man, how he will finally find his fortune after some more adventures.. and how the last viestges of his kindess and optimisim towards others die at the hands of a certain fake scotish gentleman. 
Next Life And Times: As is tradition for this series act openers, Scrooge returns home.. and just in time to get his castle back, fight a duel and go to heaven and back. So an average McDuck tuesday then. 
If you liked this review follow for more. And if you liked it a lot join my patreon so I can keep making these and hit my stretch goals. Even at just the 2 dollar level you get access to my discord and your pick of shorts whenever I do a series of them and with Goofy and Donald’s birthdays being the next ones to be celebrated you can’t pick a better time. patreon.com/popculturebuffet See you at the next rainbow. 
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sammylawrencereal · 4 years ago
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pee pee -revenant (apex legends) -krieg (borderlands 2) -valentine (skullgirls) -dr. alto clef (scp foundation) -bloodhound (apex legends) -junko enoshima (danganronpa) -zer0 (borderlands 2) -kaiji itou (kaiji: ultimate survivor) -akagi shigeru (akagi) -star platinum (jjba: stardust crusaders) -solid snake (metal gear solid) -scout (team fortress 2) -benrey (HLVRAI) -ibara saegusa (enstars) -violinist (identity v) -feastur (identity v) -cowboy (identity v) -postman (identity v) -first
fart
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theknightonabike · 6 years ago
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My father’s birthday was yesterday.
My brain doesn’t stir up a lot of memories these days. The easy excuse is that my brain injuries have erased, or rather blocked access to a lot of memories..
It’s an easy excuse... like most fables there is truth to it, but it is not the entire truth I am sure. Sometimes not having memories is a good thing. Sometimes they mask things that have been lost so that we can move in the present.
When I was growing up, my father would take me hunting. We hunted for the best..... or at least the most ancient of reasons: To feed ourselves.
We were quite poor. It wasn’t because my father didn’t have options. Certainly he had potential and brains and drive to steer his life in many different ways. He chose to help people. So that meant we were poor.
He had an old shit brown ford galaxy. You know the type; brown vinyl seats accompanied with brown carpet that grew mushrooms when it got too wet. The cracked brown vinyl dash was virginal, as it had never been penetrated by the manufacturer to install an am radio. That option was an unjustifiable extravagance.
Dad always wanted a Jeep... he desperately wanted to be an outdoorsman, but truth be told, he was too much of a scholar. He used to buy field and stream magazines and lust after all the gadgets and locations and antlers.
But that day, we would settle for some snowshoe rabbits.
I don’t even know if those particular kind of dirt roads exist in Colorado anymore... I suspect most of them are now paved to ease the penetration of pampered California hipsters as they document all the secret places on overflowing instagrams.
The pictures capture everything but the ghosts of dead Indians and mountain men scratching their heads over the existence 600 dollar sleeping bags.
How intensely ironic it is that I will probably post this on Instagram.
The bald tires of the shit brown ford galaxy churned the dust, which poured into the open windows and covered our tongues and the cracked dash with wild earth.
I remember the taste... I have tasted many other dirt roads, and have been thrown into the dust in many countries, but there is nothing like the taste of Colorado dirt road.
It tasted like dead cowboys and stardust,
I peered out the window, watching the sagebrush slowly creep by as Dad drove the shit brown Galaxy through gullies and rises. That car had absolutely no business being where it was..
And maybe neither did we. Even back then, I had a sense that there are places that should extract pain for the privilege to see. Some places shouldn’t be so easy to see and feel and taste..
This was long before I read anything Edward Abby wrote, but I know now that we tasted the same dust and, in some ways, had the same thoughts.
I was around 8 years old. I had just figured out how to make babies from the copious books and encyclopedias Dad always kept around.
Normally, these hunting trips had a certain rhythm to them. Dad would drive the shit brown Galaxy, and I would yammer incessantly about very important nothings. He would nod and comment at the appropriate times.
When Dad found the right nondescript juniper tree, or the perfect unnamed game trail, he would pull the creaking shit brown Galaxy off the “road”. We would get out, shake the Colorado dust off, and grab our gear.
Dad had a 12 gauge. I had my precious .410 with no shells.
My job was to scramble into the junipers and masses of sagebrush to flush out our quarry. The rabbits would panic, Dad would shoot them, We would thank the animal for it’s flesh, and take their gutless bodies to be eaten, thanking God that he deigned to make us apex predators.
There is a comforting simplicity to such acts.
This time was different somehow. We were riding completely in silence. Something had shifted between us, and I didn’t know what.
Maybe it was because I knew what girls were used for now. Maybe it was because I was tired of trampling through sage brush with an impotent shotgun. Maybe it was because the incessant childhood prattle was slowly being pushed out of my head. I don’t know..
The Dust tasted the same, but the air between us didn’t,
Dad eased the front left tire into a washout, gunning exactly at the right time to keep enough momentum for the Shit brown Galaxy to avoid being high centered on the bank.
He looked at me, and said nothing, waiting for me to prattle like a child.
I didn’t. I didn’t feel like a child anymore. I had seen dead men, and knew what that meant. I had torn the guts from deer and rabbits, hot blood coating my hands, and thanked them for their flesh. I had thrown a boy through a glass door because he made me mad. I had felt the sweet crunch of a boy’s nose under my fist. I had suffered from someone else’s righteous indignation.
I didn’t feel like a child anymore, but the Wild Colorado Dust couldn’t have cared less. Neither did the shit brown ford Galaxy.
Dad looked at me. Apparently he had found the right unmarked pile of dried tumbleweeds and stopped the creaking carcass of the brown machine. He turned the key off, and it sighed in it’s own unique way; as if it felt every mile separating it from it’s birthplace in Louisville Ky with absolute clarity.
Without a word, Dad reached over to the glove box, and took out a box of .410 shells. He handed me the box.
That was how I became a man.
I miss the incessant prattle of childhood. I miss the bosom of my mother and the long-suffering amusement of my father. I miss that shit brown ford galaxy and the Colorado dust and the sickly sweet blood of rabbits and righteous simplicity.
But he made me what I am, and kept me from being who I would have been. We are not the same, and yet will always be the same.
I love you, Father. Thank you.
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vorepizza · 7 years ago
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SHORT BIOS!
Hey there! I redid my old bios cause I wasn't satisfied with most of what I wrote. Give these new ones a read!
GEN-TEC SCIENCE SQUAD:
Robin: The cyborg scientist in formerly in charge of their Beast Handling Division, now demoted to an Unconventional Testing Outpost in Boudreaux. With her experiments split between a small laboratory and a juice bar, Robin is in charge of four clone assistants, two defective Multiflora, and a Meridian security guard. She hopes to return to her former department along with the rest of her team. Except Amber.
Epsilon: One of Robin’s first assistants, Epsilon is a tropical screech owl harpy. She runs the Aqua de Vita juice bar alongside her partner, Delta. She greets every customer with a smile, and always gets them to take part of whatever special event is happening in the bar. Alpha and Beta are absolutely enamored with her.
Delta: Robin’s other original assistant, A maine coon catgirl, with a penchant for roughhousing. She takes charge of the main setup for the special public testing events Robin instructs them to perform, as well as bartering for juice from Amber. She really likes hunting, and cowboys
Beta: An albino bunny girl, Beta was assigned to Robin’s lab after the scientist’s reassignment. There’s always a smile on her face, and she tries her best to help Robin and the others however she can. She spends a lot of time with Alpha, and the two have become very close, though this often makes them the target of one of Delta’s hunts.
Alpha: Alpha is the latest of Robin’s assistants, a naga/lamia with a disproportionately long tail compared to her smaller human half. She’s chipper and eager to please, but her naivete and impish nature have gotten her into trouble on many occasions. She was sent to Robin’s new lab from the same department as Amber and Ginger after the three of them pulled a prank on their creator.
Amber: Amber is a nectar Multiflora, a variation of the species with the ability to produce a nutritious juice from the many fruits she grows on her body. While her nectar is delicious (and slightly addictive), she refuses to give it out without compensation, which evolved into a habit of hoarding. She always gets peoples’ names and turns of phrase wrong, no matter how many times they correct her.
Ginger: A carnivorous multiflora, Ginger can grow any fruit on her body after consuming meat. She’s threatened and tried to eat Robin’s assistants and security guard many times, but being the size of a houseplant and stuck in a pot make it hard for her to back it up.
Millie: A crossover hire from Meridian Securities, Millie is a dog girl who serves as Robin’s guard. Her soft hearted nature makes her often the subject of bullying and teasing from Delta and Amber. Robin mainly has her take care of Alpha and Beta, but she’ll also be recalled for odd jobs from Meridian now and then.
LAST OF THE CRIMSON CORSAIRS:
Lavina: Lavina is an angelic Seraph who excels at cooking, partly thanks to her abilities with fire and heat. She lives on Boudreaux’s island lighthouse along with Irin and Gaige, but travels to the mainland daily to bake at her café, Seraph Sweets. Centuries ago in the Crimson Corsairs, she served as the Guele Gourmand, finding many tasty and exotic meals in her time on the high seas.
Irin: A demonic Seraph who can induce sleep and influence dreams, Irin mainly spends her time helping Lavina in her bakery, mixing up batter, infusing treats with a spell, or serving dine-in customers. While normally curt with most people, she’s recently taken interest in a particular recurring diner, and offers to take her on a charter cruise whenever she comes in, a hobby left over from her time as the Hibiscus Helmsdemon.
Gaige: Gaige is a human witch particularly skilled in enchantments, often being hired by museums and universities to identify what an artifact or relic is imbued with. Aside from this, she also acts as a representative for Lavina or Irin, especially for dubious meetings in The Siren’s Den. She was the Inceppamento Incantatore long ago, after the Corsairs rescued her from a ritual by the Voidskull Cult.
Umbra: Formerly part of The Penumbral Terror, a cursed Celestial worshipped by the Voidskull Cult, Umbra is the essence trapped inside of Gaige after an interrupted ritual. Being severed from the Terror granted Umbra independent sentience, as well as multiplying Gaige's lifetime, but takes over Gaige's body from time to time as a consequence. She had a habit of getting them into more trouble than out of it, but now she’s just a minor nuisance.
AURELIA GAMING:
Lorelei: A silver-scaled Iridescent Shieldtail lamia with a fascination for fantasy, Lorelei runs the Enchanted Forest side of her family’s gaming store. She and Reva are close friends, and run campaigns with Alex, Amber, and occasionally Trish. She loves to fight in real-life gladiator battles, and always has her gear at the ready.
Ophelia: A black-scaled Iridescent Shieldtail lamia with a fixation on science fiction, Ophelia runs the Black Hole side of her family’s gaming store. She prefers playing paintball or laser tag with Katie and Harley instead, but since they all work together, she finds ways to have fun. She has a habit of vanishing suddenly, sometimes even mid conversation.
Reva: The golden orb weaver dridder who works in the Aurelia Gaming store. She always plays a thief to Lorelei’s gladiator, but she loves teasing her coworkers when they aren't in a campaign, especially those in the Black Hole. After an after-hours game, she's been known to frequent The Siren’s Den.
Katie: Katie is just a human trying to live her life, but often finds herself the target of misfortune. She and Alex were deeply in love, but a series of tribulations resulted in Alex losing her memories and Katie being indebted to a Celestial. Whenever she can, she tries to drown her sorrows at Aqua de Vita.
Alex: Alex is a mute dog girl who had a near death experience that struck her with amnesia. The only things she could remember were her step-sister Millie, and that she lives with the Aurelia twins. Her cheery attitude makes her a delight to her friends, but she gets uncomfortable whenever Katie pays her too much attention, an unfortunately all-too-often experience.
Harley: Often found dozing around the Aurelia Gaming store, Seraph Sweets, and Aqua de Vita, Harley is an incredibly sleepy fox girl. Whenever she's awake, or at least less tired, she's fidgety, feverish, and/or focused. Under one such spell, she teleported herself and Katie right into the Siren’s office, and almost lost her soul. Katie’s kept a wary eye on her roommate ever since, but still lets her handle snack runs.
THE SIREN’S DEN
Libra: Libra is a courier for the mysterious, enigmatic, and infamous captain known as the Siren. She keeps a bandana wrapped around her mouth, and her backpack is covered in cat stickers. The half-covered Meridian logo suggests she has a history with the company.
The Amazing Trish: A half-tiger magician who was desperate for work after losing her gig at the Azure Apex, Trish was brought into the Den as an entertainer by her girlfriend Soleil. When she plays solo, she usually does tricks with fire or cards, but she's recently been training in partner performances, expanding her repertoire to juggling, hypnotism, and escape acts. She loves tabletop gaming and visits the Aurelias whenever she has time to spare.
Soleil: A dullahan who works partly as an entertainer, enforcer, and bartender for The Siren. Soleil is in charge of the Den whenever her employer is out, which often leads to her using the club for a private romantic get-together with Trish. She isn't fond of Libra, and always makes sure there's some odd job to send her away on.
Pepper: Known as one of the fastest drivers in the city, Pepper is often hired as a getaway driver by patrons in the Den, and sometimes The Siren herself. For her day job, she works deliveries for both Pizza Port, and her sister Lavina. Her gluttonous appetite has required Lavina to bake a separate batch of treats for Pepper to eat instead of the intended delivery.
ILENA’S OASIS
Ilena: A Celestial who make plants bloom and water flow just by digging her hands into the earth. She created a grand Oasis when she landed on the planet, and was worshipped by many surrounded villages, who she'd either grace with her bounty or curse with a drought at her whims. Several centuries passed and she became largely forgotten, so she decided to travel the world and pick worshippers on her own, her most recent choice a Seraph from the Azure Apex, and a lamia from a store in Boudreaux.
Lyra: Lyra was a masseuse at the famous mountain temple-turned-resort Azure Apex, but was spirited away by Ilena to serve her instead. The angelic Seraph accepted this with an excessively fervid glee, instantly smitten with her Celestial patron and pledging to stay at her side. She regards Ophelia with great disdain, preferring herself as the only apple of Ilena’s eye, and starting a fight almost every time Ilena summons the lamia.
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thesnhuup · 7 years ago
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Hell’s Nerds, a Week in Arizona by Motorcycle
It has become commonplace for people taking motorcycle trips to make two observations: that riding a motorcycle is like meditation and that meeting “locals” across the country is a reminder that people are mostly good and kind, even when they seem so different than the rider.  Four friends and I just completed a 1400 mile, six day ride around Arizona and I’m about to expand a bit on those two aforementioned themes as I experienced them, so feel free to stop right here as I’ll add little new insight. But if you’re interested, or just want to see the pictures…
I’ve ridden motorcycles on and off since I was a teenager, part of a general love of all things motorized.  My current bike is a Ducati Multistrada 1200S, a sport touring bike that is beautiful and crazy powerful.  It has a sport bike monster of an engine with 160hp and 95.5 Ib-ft of torque, a throw-you-off-the-back-of-the-bike amount of power that isn’t even happy until it is over 4000rpm.  In other words, way too much bike for my more tepid riding style.
Two in the group were also riding Multistradas and, as experienced track riders, they put the bikes’ capabilities to good use.  Aside from the three Multistradas, we had a new Triumph T120 and a BMW R1200 GSA, the most refined and technically perfect bike in the group. The Ducatis are the partner you want for a crazy weekend in Vegas, the BMW is the stable, capable person you want to marry.
This was a week’s vacation on some of the best motorcycle roads in America, culminating in the famous old Route 666, the Devil’s Highway, on the final day. Arizona is a biker’s dream.  Once out of the cities, we enjoyed mile after mile of twisty and looping roads with few cars, across an array of stunning landscapes and elevations.  We tore across open plains and high desert in the heat, and then ascended to as much as 9000’, pulling over to add layers and turn on our heated grips.  We descended in and out of canyons, with 90 degree after 90 degree turn.
  We drove along the south rim of the Grand Canyon, stunning vistas wherever the trees opened up and the road closed in on the edge.  But the highlight was the Devil’s Highway (now route 190), maybe the most famous motorcycling road in America: 100 miles and 1100 turns.  Some of those turns were so tight, we had to drop into first gear and practically walk the bikes around them, others were wide sweeping arcs along vertigo-inducing drops offs, without a guard rail in sight.
There were no cars, no cops, and no help if you got it wrong.  So it required unwavering concentration and that is where the meditative aspects of motorcycles come in.
I’ve tried meditation and I’m just awful at it.  Within seconds of “emptying my mind,” I’m making grocery lists, worrying about work matters, and wondering if the Patriots will trade for a new offensive lineman before the trading deadline.  But when riding my bike, especially on the roads we experienced last week, there was not a single other thought than what was right in front of us.  More feel than thinking, the experience is simply speed, and line, and the apex of the turn, and lining up the next turn – over and over again.  It was exhilarating and tiring and completely restorative.  Even as the slowest rider in the group, the “flow” when one is finding the right line and speed, trusting the bike and (I know this is sounding really corny now) and feeling one with it, is like skiing when carving perfect arcing turns – it is smooth and feels effortless and takes on a rhythm that is almost soothing, even though the consequences of being lulled or inattentive are severe.  Having done a recent track day and receiving some technical instruction, it was also an exercise in trying to be disciplined about technique, sometimes trusting it over one’s gut, and other times letting instinct and a desire for survival decide what the next move should be.  All the bikes are so exquisitely engineered that they can do almost anything we have the courage to ask of them. There were moments when I could almost hear my bike saying, “Oh dear Lord, open up the throttle and let’s go.”
Ironic then, that my only mishap was going zero mph, when a combination of a hard front brake, a slight turn of the wheel, and a bit of gravel under the front tire sent my Ducati and me to the ground.  Basic law of physics here: make sure that your foot is firmly planted on the ground just before coming to a full stop or bad things happen.  My only injury was a bruised ego, whole some super glue and rubber bands took care of the bike.
Christian, our friend from the UK, was riding the Triumph on the Devil’s Highway and while the rest of us managed all 1100 turns, he did 1009, resulting in a slightly banged up bike and a slightly banged up rider, though modern protective gear does an amazing job.
  In both cases, locals commented that the damages gave the bikes a “bad ass” look.  They didn’t say that about us, mind you.  Though what can one expect when we dubbed ourselves the Hell’s Nerds biker gang?
Speaking of locals, let me turn to theme #2.  There is something about moving through country on a motorcycle that feels more “in” the place, where you get the smells and the air and the feel of a place better than in the iron and glass cocoon of a car. We certainly saw lovely Flagstaff and new age Sedona, and the rediscovered and artsy Jerome, but we also went through gritty mining towns like Globe and rural ranching and hunting/fishing towns like Alpine, and heartbreakingly bleak reservation lands for both the Navajo and Apache.  Along the way we chatted with people (the bikes often drew people to us) and found them to be warm and hospitable and helpful.
We had a great breakfast in chilly Alpine, waiting for the temps to rise a bit before heading out on Route 666. A whole corner of the Café is dedicated to framed photos and newspaper clippings of locals who fought in our wars, going back to WWII, Vietnam, and many for Iraq and Afghanistan.  More than one for someone who had been killed or wounded.  Our waitress was someone who wished for a blizzard so she could be snowed in for a few days, who shoots an elk each winter, and was quick with a story.  Her counterpart at the Tal Wi Wi Saloon, a terrific bar, was also helpful and friendly and gave me advice about navigating the road ahead, including, “If you get hurt there, it’ll be a long time before help finds you.”
I settled in there to do some work (there are few better places to do work, I find), a hunting show on the television behind me.  Cowboys came in later, with mustaches out of central casting, and a hunter came in with full camo, his rifle in the back window of his pickup, parked outside.  Every one of them looked like they could take care of themselves, no matter what the predicament.
It reminded me of how different is much of the West.  There is an independence and individuality that seems in the DNA.
I had breakfast with a truck driver early one morning, we finding ourselves the only two people in the Best Western breakfast room.  He is former Special Forces, living on a sprawling old farm outside of Houston.  He now owns 16 trucks and when I asked him about finding good employees, he says he only hires former Special Forces guys: “Guys who call you with the solution they came up with before they tell you the problem.”  He was flooded during the hurricane, but got his cattle to high ground and his trucks out of town, so has survived it reasonably well.  Not sure how it came up, but we talked about losing our mothers fairly recently and how much we both missed them and how lucky we were to have them so long (his had also passed in her 90s).  There was enough in the conversation to tell me we probably see a lot of political issues in very different ways, but we were instead talking about family and managing people and businesses and, of course, motorcycles (he was inspired to now buy one again), and while our worlds couldn’t be more different in some ways, I thought I’d be lucky to call someone like him my friend.
I guess in the end I am simply evoking that oft-repeated second theme: that if you spend time with people – even people whose world and political views are at odds with your own – you find that they are mostly pretty nice, that generalizations don’t hold up very well, and if you listen for a while, you learn some things.  Amanda Ripley had a wonderful piece in the WSJ earlier this year about the need for a domestic cultural exchange program. I was reminded of it last week.  More than ever, we could all spend some time with people different than ourselves and we might find out some things about them we never guessed and some surprising things about ourselves in the process.
http://ift.tt/2miFUW0 from President's Corner http://ift.tt/2miG5k8 via IFTTT
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zackgidiolect · 8 years ago
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Which One Is Going To Win The Basketball
At this point, several people have asked me to explain my bracket choices, such that I feel I should just lay it out for everyone in writing. This is my first March Madness bracket ever, so I apologize if I don’t always use the correct terminology. As it was explained to me, five of the members of each team will meet on a basketball court and do battle to determine the winner. It all seems pretty self-explanatory, but still, maybe seeing it all at once will make my thinking more apparent, and help others to correctly predict the outcome.
East
Villanova (Wildcats) over Mount St. Mary’s (Mountaineers). This is an easy matchup, one we’ve seen time and time again. The Mount St. Mary’s squad, though they come from a sacred mountain, are still just mountaineers, mountain climbers. Villanova, on the other hand, are vicious wildcats. Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary were great heroes of our age for climbing Mount Everest, but I don’t doubt they’d have been massacred by five wildcats, even if they’d had three friends to back them up. This is the first result for “Mountaineer” on Google:
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Wisconsin (Badgers) over Virginia Tech (Hokies). I had to look into what Virginia Tech’s “Hokies” are, as near as I could determine they are some sort of turkey. Wisconsin are five badgers. They would slaughter them, as any turkey farmer can tell you.
Virginia (Cavaliers) over UNC Wilmington (Seahawks). Virginia’s team is five cavaliers, mounted and armored knights. Wilmington are seahawks. I mean, I suppose if they could claw their opponents’ eyes out they’d have a shot, but they have the misfortune of going up against the only first-round team with armored visors.
Florida (Gators) over East Tennessee State (Buccaneers). Gators are essentially the armored knights of the swamp. They are huge, strong, and vicious. East Tennessee State are basically five sailors, possibly armed with low-quality firearms. Gators are vulnerable to small arms fire, but not the low-quality hand weapons of the eighteenth and nineteenth-century high seas. The Gators will likely devour the Buccaneers.
USC (Trojans) over Southern Methodist University (Mustangs). This is an upset, but predictable. The Trojans had well-developed skills in animal husbandry, and though five wild horses on a basketball court is nothing to take lightly, I don’t doubt USC will prevail.
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Baylor (Bears) over New Mexico State (Aggies). Have you ever seen five bears go up against five agricultural students? Neither have I, but I don’t imagine it’s pretty.
Marquette (Golden Eagles) over South Carolina (Gamecocks). Golden eagles are apex predators, the kings of the sky. A “gamecock” is a fighting rooster. Marquette could probably take this five-on-one.
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Duke (Blue Devils) over Troy (Trojans). I had never seen a blue devil before, but Duke has a helpful illustration they distribute (depiction above by Gustave Dore). Devils, even lesser devils, can probably prevail over Trojans, all of whom are almost certainly in hell for being heathens. Likely limbo, assuming they were righteous heathens, but still.
West
Gonzaga (Bulldogs) over South Dakota State (Jackrabbits). When I first heard Gonzaga were bulldogs, I assumed they’d get crushed. But, as it happens, South Dakota State are jackrabbits. I don’t know much about basketball, but I don’t imagine you can win a basketball battle by running away.
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Northwestern (Wildcats) over Vanderbilt (Commodores). The wildcats return, this time sinking their teeth into Vanderbilt’s flag officers. Or even worse, five chief executives of yacht clubs. Nowhere near a fair fight.
Princeton (Tigers) over Notre Dame (Fighting Irish). I’ve heard a lot about Notre Dame’s Fighting Irish, being a bit Irish myself, but even five of them, very angry and belligerent, are no match for five tigers, the largest and deadliest of big cats. This is another example of a fight that could come out the same way five-on-one.
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Bucknell (Bison) over West Virginia (Mountaineers). Again we have a squad comparable to Norgay, Hillary, Muir, and other great examples of endurance and tenacity, cruelly put up against some of nature’s most implacable foes. Bucknell’s bison will crush the five mountaineers, crampons and ice axes notwithstanding.
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Xavier (Musketeers) over Maryland (Terrapins). Musketeers can only fire one bullet before needing to spend between 20 and 30 seconds to reload. Fortunately, their opponents are small turtles. The end.
Florida State (Seminoles) over Florida Gulf Coast University (Eagles). Eagles are fearsome against smaller prey, but I think the Seminoles could make short work of them on a basketball court.
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St. Mary (Gaels) over Virginia Commonwealth (Rams). Rams, or sheep, are something the Gaelic-speaking peoples of the British archipelago know a thing or two about.
Arizona (Wildcats) over North Dakota (Fighting Hawks). While hawks are worthy adversaries, especially when bred for fighting, cats’ genocide of all things that fly is well-documented. Bigger cats can only spell more trouble for our winged friends.
Midwest
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Kansas (Jayhawks) over UC Davis (Aggies). I had imagined a jayhawk was some sort of bird, but as it happens, there is no such bird as a jayhawk. Rather, the Jayhawks were violent anti-slavery guerillas during the turbulent run-up to the civil war. John Brown was a Jayhawk. UC Davis’s agricultural students don’t stand a chance.
Miami (Hurricanes) over Michigan State (Spartans). While the Spartans were raised from birth for combat, they never had to do battle with the furious hurricanes of the Florida gulf. Five of them would undoubtedly do them in.
Iowa State (Cyclones) over Nevada (Wolf Pack). I did some research, and apparently there are five to six wolves in a typical wolf pack. Even assuming Nevada has five six-wolf packs to send forth, they can’t hope to prevail in the first round. Pacific cyclones have caused unspeakable devastation, and are one of the deadliest meteorological phenomena we experience on earth. Forget about it.
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Purdue (Boilermakers) over Vermont (Catamounts). Although Vermont’s catamounts are five deadly cougars, Purdue’s boilermakers will likely bring their welding gear. It will be close, and will come down to maneuverability versus endurance. My money is on the boilermakers.
Rhode Island (Rams) over Creighton (Blue Jays). This won’t be a satisfying win. Rhode Island’s rams won’t be able to reach Creighton’s blue jays, so their best bet will be to simply wait until the small birds exhaust themselves and drop.
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Iona (Gaels) over Oregon (Ducks). Gaels know a thing or two about how to cook a duck.
Oklahoma State (Cowboys) over Michigan (Wolverines). Even unhorsed, a cowboy is more than a match for a wolverine, to say nothing of five cowboys. Michigan doesn’t stand a chance.
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Jacksonville (Gamecocks) over Louisville (Cardinals). Finally, a win for fighting roosters! Cardinals have the maneuverability, true, but you need fighting spirit and power to win a game of basketball (I’m told). Jacksonville’s gamecocks will take this one.
South
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Texas Southern (Tigers) over North Carolina (Tarheels). I’m going to catch some flak here, because apparently Michael Jordan, star of Space Jam, once played for North Carolina. However, I will point out that North Carolina are five guys with tarred heels. Even taking their legend at face value that their five are tenacious confederate soldiers, they are up against five tigers. Remember The Ghost And The Darkness? Big cats annihilate trained soldiers with nineteenth-century weapons.
Seton Hall (Pirates) over Arkansas (Razorbacks). Razorbacks are among the most dangerous of swine, but I don’t doubt that Seton Hall’s pirates know how to butcher a pig.
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Middle Tennessee (Blue Raiders) over Minnesota (Golden Gophers). I don’t feel good about this one, because I think golden gophers would be adorable to see, and I don’t want to watch blue raiders slaughter them. But I’ll cover my eyes and call it.
Winthrop (Eagles) over Butler (Bulldogs). Bulldogs, while more than a match for jackrabbits (see above), could probably be carried away by an eagle in one talon. Not pleasant.
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Kansas State (Wildcats) over Cincinatti (Bearcats). Based on my research, a bearcat is an arboreal mammal from southeast Asia, sort of a combination between a beaver and a sloth. Yet again, wildcats will prevail. I’m just going to say, I am not happy about Wake Forest’s loss in the lead-up to this match. I would have loved to see some possessed demon deacons in this tournament (blue devils versus demon deacons, can you imagine?). That said, it doesn’t surprise me that the power of the Great Deceiver yielded to the ferocity of mountain cats. Ah well, maybe next year.
UCLA (Bruins) over Kent State (Golden Flashes). UCLA’s team is five brown bears. Kent State is five golden flashes. Disorienting, but ultimately futile. Full disclosure, I went to UCLA Law, three-time champions in the annual UCLA Law-USC Law basketball game. A predictable result, bears are a nightmare. Go Legal Bruins!
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Wichita State (Shockers) over Dayton (Flyers). This was an interesting matchup. Dayton’s team appears to be five of the Wright Brothers’ Flyer, which I’m not sure would even fit on a basketball court. Wichita State’s team are five “shockers,” which despite the association are actually people who harvest wheat. Having dated a hay farmer’s daughter, I can tell you that five wheat harvesters could easily destroy five twelve-mile-an-hour gliders made of bicycle parts. Hell, throw in ten of those guys in the funny hats if you like. Still, we may not see another matchup this unusual for a long time.
Northern Kentucky (Norse Men) over Kentucky (Wildcats). While it pains me to have to choose between Kentuckies, and while wildcats have won almost every matchup they’ve been in thus far, I favor the Viking warriors in this one. Northern Kentucky’s Norse Men will win the day.
Round two
With a lot of the interesting teams already eliminated, this will be a more summary affair. I’ll only comment where the matchup is interesting.
Villanova over Wisconsin. Wildcats > Badgers.
Virginia (Cavaliers) over Florida (Gators). Although alligators could easily ground combatants on horseback, the cavaliers are still armored, with lance and sword. This would be an interesting contest, with a lot of action, but eventually I think Virginia’s cavaliers will take the day.
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Baylor (Bears) over USC (Trojans). Bears are fast and strong, and might be the deadliest animals on land. Trojans were outsmarted by a wooden horse.
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Duke (Blue Devils) over Marquette (Golden Eagles). Eagles are no match for the azure minions of hell.
Northwestern over Gonzaga. Wildcats > Bulldogs.
Princeton (Tigers) over Bucknell (Bison). This would likely also be an interesting match, ten of the heaviest land animals going head-to-head. However, at the end of the day, bison are herbivores and are accustomed to travel in packs much larger than five precisely because of the dangers posed by carnivores like tigers. Princeton wins.
Florida State (Seminoles) over Xavier (Musketeers). This was a very tough call. In the end, it came down to heart. The Seminole tribe has endured immense hardship, from colonial wars (fought with muskets!) to genocide, and are still standing, with presences in both Florida and Oklahoma. The musketeers vanished when Louis XVI couldn’t afford them.
Arizona over St. Mary. While it pains me, as a one-quarter Irishman, to admit it, Wildcats > Gaels.
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Miami (Hurricanes) over Kansas (Jayhawks). While the abolitionist militia members were the scourge of slave power in Kansas, life on the prairie would likely not have prepared them to face five raging gulf hurricanes in a basketball arena.
Iowa State (Cyclones) over Purdue (Boilermakers). Again, one cyclone is a calamity. Five cyclones is an apocalypse. Weld your way out of that one.
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Iona (Gaels) over Rhode Island (Rams). Essentially the same matchup as St. Mary-Virginia Commonwealth in Round 1, the Gaels will take the rams out to pasture.
Oklahoma State (Cowboys) over Jacksonville (Gamecocks). Cowboys and roosters? Come on.
Texas Southern (Tigers) over Seton Hall (Pirates). While it’s not unthinkable that five armed humans could take on five tigers, they’ll need to be better armed and armored than they would have been in the age of high-sea pirates. While the heavily-armed modern pirates of the horn of the Indian Ocean might fare better, Seton Hall explicitly chose kerchiefed, eyepatched, mustachioed brigands to be their champions, and must live with that choice.
Middle Tennessee (Blue Raiders) over Winthrop (Eagles). While this would be an interesting matchup, the blue raiders’ reflexes would likely carry the day against diving eagles with proper tactical positioning.
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UCLA (Bruins) over Kansas State (Wildcats). Again, bears.
Northern Kentucky (Norse Men) over Wichita State (Shockers). While field-hands are some of the strongest, and nicest, people you’ll ever meet, the Vikings did raise a bit of hell, historically. The Norse Men will probably take this.
The Sweet Sixteen
Virginia (Cavaliers) over Villanova (Wildcats). Wildcats, though they’ve had a lot of wins in this bracket, are no matched for armored cavalry.
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Baylor (Bears) over Duke (Blue Devils). Although Duke’s blue devils are the thralls of the Deceiver, bears were on the Ark, and so we can assume God put them here for a reason. This matchup is probably why.
Princeton (Tigers) over Northwestern (Wildcats). Biggest cat.
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Florida State (Seminoles) over Arizona (Wildcats). Part of the Seminole tribe, following war with the mighty US government, retreated into the Everglades and never surrendered. They are now the modern Seminole Tribe of Florida, and own the Hard Rock Cafe in Times Square. This is who you want when wildcats come calling.
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Iowa State (Cyclones) over Miami (Hurricanes). We all knew this was coming. In the end, it came down to numbers. I consulted lists of the last five Atlantic hurricanes and Pacific cyclones, and as it turns out, the last five category 5 Pacific cyclones were category 5 for more combined hours. It’s as simple as that. Iowa State wins.
Oklahoma State over Iona. Sorry Gaels, but the Cowboys take this one.
Texas Southern (Tigers) over Middle Tennessee (Blue Raiders). Huge cats. Little humans.
UCLA (Bruins) over Northern Kentucky (Norse Men). Can you see where this is going?
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Elite Eight
Baylor (Bears) over Virginia (Cavaliers). Werner Herzog made a movie about a guy in an armored suit who was eaten by a bear. That times five will be this game.
Princeton (Tigers) over Florida State (Wildcats). A wildcat is one thing, but a tiger is a beast.
Iowa State (Cyclones) over Oklahoma State (Cowboys). Do they do much disaster preparedness on the frontier? How many cowboys could swim, do you figure?
UCLA (Bruins) over Texas Southern (Tigers). This is close, but in the cruel past of our civilization, bears and tigers were actually made to fight in circuses. The bears always won.
Final Four
Baylor (Bears) over Princeton (Tigers). UCLA over Texas Southern all over again.
Iowa State (Cyclones) over UCLA (Bruins). Bears can swim, but they can also drown.
National Champion - Iowa State Cyclones
People may complain that it’s impossible for Iowa State or Miami not to win this tournament, as they are massively destructive forces of nature. This is absolutely true. But hey, I didn’t write the rules of the game of basketball, whatever they are. I predict that either Iowa State or Miami will continue to be national champions every year until the NCAA changes the rules.
For what it’s worth, I went to Ithaca College, whose basketball team was Division III I assume because they recognized how unfair it would be to expect other Division I teams to go up against the Bombers. So, I feel for you.
Anyhow, that’s it for now. I’ve learned a lot about basketball! Mainly how many wildcats know how to play it. Wow. See you next year!
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