So, does anyone have big Rose Festival plans? I usually go down to the Grand Floral Parade, but that's about it.

When I was 17, my friend and I took a tour of one of the navy ships during fleet week. We wandered off from the tour and got ourselves kicked off the ship and told never to return. I've never returned to the navy ships, although I assume by now they've forgotten about me. We didn't see anything interesting on our detour. Hoping this is long enough...

I've been reading with some fascination the Rockets' fans assessment of the officiating last night, which many have declared to be the worst they've ever seen.

With the exception of the (dare I say it) flop that Roy pulled off in the corner to get a foul call on Battier, I didn't notice much that was terrible last night.

Actually, what I did notice was what I thought were bad calls against the Blazers.  When Yao accidentally knocked a Houston player into Joel, who was facing the other way and was called for his 5 foul, for instance. 

But I'm also fascinated that we can apparently see the exact same play in slow motion and disagree with it.  The foul on Rudy with 1.3 seconds.  A couple of Houston fans swear that no one touched him (after viewing it over and over), while a few Portland fans declare he was tripped (after viewing it over and over).  I myself only viewed it once and thought, whew, thank God it was Rudy this time and not Travis.

Apparently fans see what they want to see. Could the refs be better, can fans ever be objective, do the refs really cost teams wins?  I know I should probably have just let this die, but it seems like an interesting psychology experiment in the making.

Oh, and could someone clear up for me once and for all: are you allowed to hold on to the other guy's jersey?  Is this a foul?? 

3:30 and no junk drawer? What, are you spending time with your families? Geez.

How about Philly's crash and burn ending against Denver yesterday. Sigh.

But here's my actual topic: I've been invited to a destination wedding in the Carribean in February. A good (but no longer especially close) friend, a lovely location. But, it will cost me close to $2000 when all is said and done. I theoretically have $2000 to spend, but would frankly rather spend it on something else. Plus I hate to fly. Should I go? And if I don't, what should I tell her?

 

Hey, did you see this?

http://blog.oregonlive.com/sportsupdates/2008/03/rose_garden_picked_to_host_nca.html

Just today I was thinking that Portland hosting these games would be fun (really an odd thing for me to think since I haven't watched a single second of NCAA ball this year).

To get to 300, just today I learned that Western Kentucky is in the tournament.  I was born in Bowling Green, KY, so I guess that makes me a fan by default.  But Hilltoppers, what the heck is a hilltopper?.  Have you seen their mascot- big red blob. But they won, so go big red!

This link is actually from Oregon Live's links (also linked today by Ben)- I thought it was pretty funny.

First Channing insults Sacramento in his blog:
http://www.channingfrye.com/blog/?p=28

Then on our sister site, the fans of Sacramento fight back.  Well, sort of:
http://www.sactownroyalty.com/story/2008/3/10/162215/065

Interesting "behind the story" blog from Jason Quick about a story set to run in tomorrow's Oregonian.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/behindblazersbeat/2008/03/the_making_of_a_point_jack_str.html

I'm curious what people with strong opinions on Jack think of the transcript of Quick's interview at the end.