My Crazy Beautiful Life: Quiz Meet #4 . . . Details . . .

(I am FINALLY posting pics and commentary from the last quiz meet that was held on April 15th. I could have just let it go, leaving it buried and unpublished in my archives but it just kept nagging at me. It was an interesting trip so I wanted to be able to look back and remember it. Now I can move on and catch up with the other things that have kept me crazy/busy for the last couple of weeks. . . )

FRIDAY:
The last quiz meet of the 2009-2010 season was held in Metolious, OR. We usually head toward Portland and the Oregon coast for our quizzing road trips which takes around 9 hours but we figured it would only take about 6 to reach Metolious so we left around 2:30 in the afternoon.

I took Gloria and Steph in my truck while Zach, Andrew and Michael rode with Gary. . .

None of us really seemed to know where we were going so it took a little longer than we thought it would. . .

For the most part, though, it was a typical road trip. . .

Typical until we hit Bend, OR, that is. . . I blew a tire going around a corner and we turned onto a side street to pull over. It was dusk and it was raining. . .

Thankfully a man in a pickup driving by stopped to see if we needed help. I didn't have the right tools in my truck to take down the spare so it took him over an hour to jimmy the tire down from it's home under my truck. He put the spare on pretty quickly once he got it out of there and then wouldn't take anything in return. I jokingly said we should buy him a case of beer and sign it, "Love and thanks from the Boise Friends Bible Quiz Team". He just asked that we do something nice for someone when we have the opportunity. He was pretty cool. . .

We rolled into Metolious sometime after 11:00 pm and were directed to the host home where we would be spending the weekend. It was dark, of course, and late, so all I could really see was a long, winding road, a few trees and quite a bit of sagebrush. We stopped in the middle of nowhere, met our tired but gracious hosts and fell into bed.

SATURDAY:

We were up early on Saturday after very little sleep on my part and made it to the church in Metolious in plenty of time. (Our host was kind enough to drive into the next town and drop off my blown tire). . .

My team was well prepared and won every round but 2 over the course of the day . .

The Verse-Off. . .

It was a little difficult for me to keep my mind on quizzing during the afternoon since I was stressing about my tire. The manager at Les Schwab called and told me it would have to be replaced and that I should buy two new ones just to be safe. The town that had my tire was about 20 minutes away so I couldn't actually go and talk to anyone until the quiz rounds were over which would be close to the 5:00 closing time. It was a little stressful. . .

My team didn't really need me anyway- they were ON FIRE!! :)

As soon as the last quiz round was over, Steph and I raced to the next town to figure out what to do about my tire. The manager of the shop met us in the parking lot and went into his spiel about how he didn't have any used tires that would fit my truck so he'd have to sell me at least one new one. He stopped mid-sentence and told me that there was one more place he could look. He was back within just a few minutes with a used tire that matched mine exactly that was in great shape. He said he could sell it to me for $50 including mounting and balancing. I'm not sure what changed his mind but it worked out great for me and we were on our way back to the quiz meet in less than 20 minutes!

We made it back just in time for the awards ceremony. . .

This is the look Zach gave me when he realized he was in the top two:

Third place:

Andrew came in second place!!!!

First place!!! :)

Our team placed 4th for the 4th meet. This is the second place team:

First place team:

Since this was the final meet, the determination for the top three quizzers is made by having the top 8 quiz against each other. The first three to answer 4 questions correctly take 1st, 2nd and 3rd place for the season.

It's fun to watch but it definitely raises my blood pressure a few notches!!

All eight of them know all of the answers so it comes down to who can jump the quickest!

Zach was the second person to answer 4 questions correctly which put him in 2nd place overall for the season.

The final meet also gives the coaches a chance to show how much we've learned in the process. Thankfully the judge dumbs down the questions for us but I still managed to screw up the only answer I had the opportunity to jump fast enough for. My question?? Spell Metolious. What can I say, I'm bad under pressure. . .

The activity for the evening was at the bowling alley in Madras. . .

SUNDAY:

Sunday morning we woke up early so we could spend a little bit of time exploring the nearby fish hatchery. On a side note, we had the best hosts EVER. I'm not crazy about staying in stranger's homes on these trips but we truly lucked out this time!! Nice people, nice home, hot showers, great food! Their names escape me now but the man (Jim??) is a fish and game officer who runs the fish hatchery and he offered to show us around before we left town. . .

Mmmmm. . .

This is Jack. He was very sweet. . .

During the course of the weekend I was under the assumption that we were in a desert in the middle of nowhere. The home we stayed in was at the end of a long road that seemed to go on and on with mostly sagebrush and fields for scenery. The house itself was nestled in a little forest of trees with lovely landscaping. . .

Nothing about my surroundings prepared me for this:

. . . or this. . .

The fish hatchery was less than 5 minutes away from the house and the scenery was absolutely beautiful!

Usually I'm not a big fan of fish hatcheries. My thinking is "you've seen one, you've seen them all" but our gracious host gave us a great tour from the inside out and answered all of our questions . . .