The undefeated Lady Demos pulled off a heart-stopping come-from-behind victory over a tenacious Hermiston Bulldogs squad last night at the Chiles Center in Portland to earn the Oregon 5A women’s basketball championship.

Jefferson struggled against a strong Hermiston defense that kept them to the outside in the first half, and trailed the Bulldogs until Janita Badon’s third period buzzer shot put the Lady Demos up by one. The Hermiston defense looked tired in the fourth, and the Jefferson offense began to click. With two minutes to go the Demos started to hold the ball to protect their small lead. Hermiston forced fouls, but Jefferson held on, sunk free throws and grabbed offensive rebounds, eventually winning 67-58.

Jefferson was led by senior Nyesha Sims, 16 points; sophomore Denaya Brazzle, 15 points; and sophomore Denise Hammick with 10 points and stellar defense.

It was an emotional finish to a perfect season. Though significantly outnumbered in their own back yard by Hermiston fans, the Jefferson family put on a show of support that spilled onto the court at the final horn.

Oh, and the Winter Hawks won last night, too, after a 22-game losing streak.

In Less than two hours, the undefeated Jefferson Lady Demos play their final game of the season, the Oregon 5A state championship, vs. Hermiston.
The Lady Demos out-hustled, out-defended and out-shot Willamette (Eugene) in the semi-final last night, winning 55-44 after a much closer first half against a spirited Willamette team.

Senior Nyesha Sims led the way with fourteen points, along with Janita Badon (pictured) with 13 and Tyrisha Blake with 10.

The University of Portland’s Chiles center was rocked by a sizable and vocal Jefferson cheering section, much of which made their way to Jefferson High to see the second-half of the men’s game, which saw Jefferson defeat Wilsonville 69-51 in their second-round playoff match up. The boys are on to state in Eugene next week.

I grew up road tripping family style. Starting with a coast-to-coast odyssey in a playpen in the back of a VW Microbus, and working my way through car, train, bus, truck and plane trips of all sorts through most of the United States and Mexico and parts of Canada and Europe.

San Rafael Reef, Utah

My traveling days, along with my ability to live out out of a backpack for months at a time, ended when I had two children. Or so it seemed. This summer, with the little ones getting bigger and with the aid of such niceties I never knew — like air conditioning and DVD players — we embarked on our first epic family road trip across the iconic landscapes of the American West. Twenty-six hundred miles of desert, forest, rock, canyon, mountain and gorge.

Shoshone Falls, Idaho

The joy of going overland is that the journey becomes a major part of the trip, rather than an annoyance to put up with on the way somewhere else. I love seeing the landscape change as I go. Read the rest of this entry »

Keeping us safe from potato pests, it’s the Opiliones:

Happy fathers’ day; our raspberries are ripe!

The Catholic Archdiocese of Portland dodged a major bullet yesterday, when a federal bankruptcy judge ruled that they don’t have to sell any properties to settle child sex abuse cases. In an answer to their prayers, they get to transfer church and school properties to the parishes. This is exactly what the gambled on when, in 2004, they were the first archdiocese in the US to file for bankruptcy protection in the face of hundreds of millions of dollars in sex abuse lawsuits.

Wacky Mommy took one look at the picture in the paper of St. Andrew’s Church in Northeast Portland and said “I wish they’d make them sell off their churches, and then they’d have to open up store-front churches like all the other churches in North Portland.” You know, like “Christ Died For Your Sins on the Bloody Cross of Holy Redemption Church of God in Christ our Lord.” But seriously, the Catholic Church’s holdings, including St. Andrew’s (pictured above) are quite ostentatious compared to the rest of the churches in the neighborhood. Would it kill them to cough up a little more to atone for protecting child sex abusers for so long?

North and Northeast Portland are home to the only historically black neighborhoods in Portland. Store-front churches abound, but with gentrification pushing in (and Portland Community College’s Cascade campus expanding), they may soon be an endangered species. So while Wacky Mommy took the Wacky Kids to swim lessons this morning, I took a brief tour of North and Northeast Portland churches.

First stop was the Christ Memorial Church of God in Christ, with its adjacent “Future Home of Community Center & Basketball Pavilion.”

Next comes what we refer to as the “LoveLee Ladee” complex, which includes both the Holiness or Hell Church of God in Christ and the Jubilee Tabernacle Full Gospel, Pentacostal Church. We refer to it as “LoveLee Ladee” because of the painted-over sign above the entrance to Holiness or Hell, indicating it used to house a beauty salon, or, uh, well, you know.

The entire complex used to be Holiness or Hell, but at some point the Jubilee Tabernacle came in.

Across the street from LoveLee Ladee is the Full Holy Ghost Mission Church of God in Christ, Inc., fronted by a lot of blacktop and a forbidding chain-link fence.

A block further, we get a threefer: A More Excellent Way Christian Center, Northwest Voice for Christ Community Church, and The Ark of Safety Church of God Pentacostal, all housed in a building with a facade made to look like Noah’s Ark.

Just a few blocks over, we come upon the Open Door House of Prayer.

I’m not posting pictures here to make fun of these joints. Even though I am a dyed-in-the-wool atheist, I respect the right of people to worship (or not) as they choose. And I am impressed by the humility of these neighborhood based churches, many of them unaffiliated with larger governing bodies. They stand in sharp contrast to the Catholic church, one of the wealthiest and most powerful organizations on the planet. And every Sunday finds them brimming over with lively music and sharply dressed parishioners (oh the hats!).

The gentrification I mentioned before recently claimed the only black funeral home in town, and turned it into a pub. I’m not shitting you. Across the street from that is the Florida Room, a hipster restaurant whose reader board proclaims it as the Church of the Bloody Mary and for a long time also sported the message “Go Team Evil! Sin all the Damn Time!” This is just a stone’s throw from the LoveLee Ladee. Of course, as an atheist, I have no problem with this personally, but it is culturally insensitive (to say the least).

In ten years, there will probably be no more store-front churches in this neighborhood. The part of me that sees religious belief as the source of global strife doesn’t care. But the part of that appreciates diversity and humility is saddened.

The Winter Hawks held their annual Skills Challenge today at the Memorial Coliseum. We took the kids to see the light-hearted intra-squad competitions, including the hardest shot, most accurate shot, fastest lap, and the finale, a 10 minute, non-stop three-on-three game.

New York Rangers property (and former Winter Hawk star) Brandon Dubinsky was in town for a visit, and graced the crowd with a little on-ice interview with Scooter during a break.

No sooner did they get to talking, than Dubi was sucker punched with a cream pie from behind.

He was a good sport…

And even shared some with Scooter.

Aw, it barely even got on him!

Later, somebody handed a mike to Kurtis Mucha, asking him if he wanted to give Dubi any grief. He took the mike and asked, “Does that jacket come in men’s?”

Last spring I wrote about Alex Charns and his seminal role in the hockey protest movement. At that time, Alex mentioned a joining-up of Canes and Oilers fans outside the RBC Center during the Stanley Cup Final, and now I’ve got the proof:

It’s heartening to see rival hockey fans from two different countries coming together with a message of peace.

I told Alex I have to root for the Sabres against the Canes in their season opener next Wednesday, since Portland hero Paul Gaustad is playing for Buffalo. He understands.

Alex wrote a great book about picking up recreational hockey during the NHL lockout, and his belief that a magic puck would save us all from the wrath of Dubya. It’s a great read. I keep meaning to review it here, and maybe I will someday. Or maybe I just did. Here: Buy this book!

Some of you, like Jenn, may have been put off by my seemingly anti-NASCAR comments a while back. So here I am trying to make it up to you. I took Himself Jr. to the local dirt track Saturday night for an evening of stock car racing excitement. I must say, it was everything I remember, with the addition of Budweiser (I was too young to drink last time I went to the races).

We got there early, and so did these guys.

Here’s something you don’t see at a hockey game: Old Glory proudly flying off the back of a Trans Am. And unlike at hockey games, the crowd did not go wild at the line “o’er the land of the free….” I’m not sure if it is out of respect for the song, or just a lack of enthusiasm. Could it be that hockey fans have a more libertarian bent than race fans?

After time trials for the late models, the racing got under way with the “pure stocks”, cars with virtually unmodified engines and chasis. Predominant stock models are Camaros, Trans Ams, Novas and Monte Carlos. (Sunset Speedway also runs street stocks, with souped up engines, modifieds, which are Frankenstein’s monsters built on passenger car frames and with open wheels on the front end, and late models, purpose-built dirt track racers.)

Race fans pretty much fit into the same demographic as hockey fans, i.e. working class. Fun for all ages. If you think NASCAR Democrats are rare, try being the only socialist in the crowd. But no problem. The fans were all really nice. We talked to a couple young boys whose Dad drives a modified. I asked how he was doing in points, and they said, well, not so good. His car keeps losing parts and he keeps crashing, they said. Sure enough, in the first heat race in the modified class, their dad slammed into the wall on the first corner of the first lap.

Some people say race fans only go to see the wrecks (kind of like hockey fans who go to see fights). Stock car racing is a full contact affair (except in the pure stock division), with lots of bumping and occasional wrecks. This car was involved in a smash up coming out of the 3 turn and nearly rolled.

Small boy enjoyed the show for a while. During warm up laps, when all four classes of racers were out on the track, he started naming them as they went by. “Late model. Late model. Modified. Late Model.” Unfortunately, we got there way too early, and by the time the heat racing started, he had seen enough cars and found a bug in the gravel under the stands. He played with that for the rest of the evening. We stayed for one late model heat, and then headed home.

As a child growing up in Iowa, I was mortified of tornados. I remember once my folks were out shopping and left me with my older siblings (who loved to torment poor, poor me). They decided it would be fun to tell me there was a tornado warning, so we all went down to the cellar and crouched in the corner. Then they got bored.

Iowa City, my home town, is somewhat on the fringes of tornado alley, but still tornado watches and warnings are things you grow up dealing with. There is nothing quite like the eerie calm that preceeds a prairie storm, with crepuscular light turning green and forboding. Then the rains and winds begin, with angry intensity. Funnel clouds can poke down along the front, but usually recede back into the blackness. The storm marches on, heading for the Mississippi, maybe dumping some golf ball sized hail on the way.

Last night was such a night in Iowa City, but one of the funnel clouds persisted and grew, and turned into and F-2 tornado. It cut an 8 mile path through the heart of town a third of a mile across. (An F2 tornado has estimated winds speeds of 113-157 mph and causes considerable damage).

The Daily Iowan has four photo galleries online: night-of-storm, morning after, and reader submitted. They also have some aerial photos.

The Iowa City Press-Citizen also has morning after and reader submitted photos.

The Des Moines Register duplicates some of these in its two galleries: damage and cleaning up and reader submitted. The register also published an approximate map of the twister’s path.

Update, 4/15/2006: All three papers listed above seem to be updating frequently. If you’re looking for Iowa City tornado photos, I recommend checking the home pages of the Daily Iowan, the Press-Citizen and the Des Moines Register. The Cedar Rapids Gazette has several galleries too. (Please post links if you find others!)