Sunset in Chewelah

Yeah... this place has a view.

J.C. Sherrit is a pretty damn good football player

This Sherrit kid... he's got some potential.

Eastern Washington University junior linebacker J.C. Sherritt has been selected to the Walter Camp Football Foundation 2009 Football Championship Subdivision All-America team. The team was selected by the head coaches and sports information directors of FCS schools.

The 2006 graduate of Pullman (Wash.) High School finished the 2009 season as the leader in NCAA Football Championship Subdivision statistics with an average of 14.17 tackles per game. He helped lead Eastern to an 8-4 record and an appearance in the FCS Playoffs -- EWU's fourth berth in the last six seasons.

He had a total of 170 stops in 2009 to break the school record of 151 set by Greg Belzer in 2000. Besides his 170 tackles, Sherritt had 14 tackles for loss, four passes broken up, three forced fumbles, four fumble recoveries and an interception he returned for a touchdown.

I'd just like to take this time and point out that Greg Belzer is from my very own hometown of Chewelah, Wash. So you know Sherritt is good if he's breaking Belzer's record. We grow them big up there. And mean.

(And sometimes a bit unemployed, but thats how we roll in Chewelah)

This weekend in review (bring your soccer cleats)

Pushing my leftist, soccer-loving agenda (good god what has happened to me?), here are some things that happened this weekend.

Brazil shocked that United States has a soccer team - Up 2-0 on one of the world's best soccer teams, the US couldn't hold on against Brazil and ended up losing 3-2. The difference? Apparently you cant win soccer games when the other team possesses the ball 60 percent of the time.

Billy Mays dies - In terms of shocking, this was up on the list. Forget about Michael Jackson, this was the guy that sold us Oxi-Clean!

Seattle Sounders FC get big win over Colorado - the boys in green shut down a team that had an 8-game unbeaten streak. The Colorado Rapids were stunned 3-0 by Seattle, Kasey Keller recorded his fifth shutout of the season (which means that Oliver Platt has scored more times than opponents of the Sounders).

Hoopfest - Judging from the amount of 50-year old men suffering from heat stroke, I'd say that it was Hoopfest weekend in Spokane. I caught the tail end of it and it was full of "those guys" that decided their 230-pound 5'4" frame was fine for non-shirt wearing. Ewwww.

The Seattle Mariners take two against the best team in baseball - Really? Those M's? If their lineup wasn't taking at-bats like it was t-ball, they might have something in Seattle.

Brandon went to Chewelah, Casey went to Montana - Where the cattle to human ratio is something like how many back-breaking strikeouts Ken Griffey Jr. has to home runs.

Ski free at 49 Degrees North

If you happen to be a snowboarder or skier and just happen to be near Chewelah, Washington (home to the one and only Brandon) then you might want to head over to 49 Degrees North.

49 Degrees North, a ski resort about 50 miles north of Spokane, will be closing for the season on Sunday, and right now they are letting everybody visiting the area ski for free.

Free is awesome!

And as for lodging, maybe Brandon will let you crash on his couch.

Epic Photo: This is what happens when you drive in Chewelah

You get stuck behind someone hauling hay. DRAT!

But the small Northeastern Washington town living does have it's advantages:

1. Traffic is about as backlogged as the people lining up to be Pac-man Jones' PR Director.
2. Deer make excellent speed bumps.
3. Keystone is the beer of choice, not that pricey Busch Light stuff.
4. You won't have to worry about running into a politician in these parts, you know, because they're looking for population centers that will vote for them. Not pass it up for Bingo Night.
5. Bingo Night rocks. By the way.
6. Chasing off people with a rifle is perfectly legal here, just don't shoot at them.
7. Fitness is actually pretty easy, with all the hunting that you do for your food, you really don't have to go to the gym. Dragging the game out of the woods burns a lot of calories too.
8. Smog... is a myth in these parts.
9. Well water, not that chlorine crap they serve you in Spokane.
10. It's like Canada, but with a much better flag.

(If you're offending by my small-town bashing, please, small-town people bash their town more than people that aren't from a small town. Only thing is, we can get away with it because our SUV is faster than your Toyota Prius.)

It could be worse, Harry Potter could be involved somehow

If you haven't heard about the vampire drama "Twilight" set in the logging town of Forks, Wash. than consider yourself one of those rare lucky people who know as much about pop culture as the Unabomber. Based on a book, it's really caught the attention of teenagers around the country, giving every goth kid something to really dream about...

Namely supernatural powers and a hot girlfriend, who will help wipe off that eyeliner.

Wonderful right? I remember when Lord of the Rings was the huge "thing." Spiderman also had that same effect and ushered in a lot more superhero movies. And don't forget the Matrix. That gave us computer geeks an urge to learn kung-fu.

Now we have movies about teenage vampires in Forks, Wash.

Since I would consider a majority of our readers college student age, the fact that you may actually like "Twilight" is disturbing. Other than the occasional dramatic treatment of the literary classic "Dracula" and the horribly campy but popcorn enjoyable "Van Hellsing" ... other vampire movies seem to really just aimed for that whole "vampire-obsessed crowd."

You know, that group that walked across the street to smoke cigarettes and be outsiders to the whole school environment. The ones who wrote pentagrams on their desk and arms. The ones who wore all-black and chains.

Wonderful.

But hey, luckily we'll have a bunch of incoming freshman in college that think they can fly from tree to tree and are afraid of sunlight. Although the latter statement is probably true of the people that played Halo a lot.

And Forks is a logging town comparable to my hometown, Chewelah, although as far as I know, we don't have a vampire problem.

Knowing plenty of people from Forks, I can tell you that they're less than thrilled that their town has become a tourist hotspot for fans of "Twilight" which is understandable. I wouldn't want those vampire fan freaks walking around my town.

Luckily, my town hasn't been included in a book or movie yet, although I can only imagine what fantastic pop culture items could come out of the place. Lets get Jack Bauer to come out here and fight some terrorists or something.

How I know I'm old

Just a few months removed from graduation I can see it's only downhill from here. Here's a couple of signs I might as well get the tombstone payment plan down.

- I'm in a bowling league, getting beat by an 80-year old woman with a limp and hair that reminds your of Marge Simpson.

- The highlight of my week is the College football pick em' game I play on ESPN.

- I watch the local news, because you know, I want to know whats going on in the neighborhood.

- I refer to high schoolers as those "meddling kids"

- Drinking gives me hangovers. I don't like hangovers anymore. Therefore I'm thinking about switching to Milwaukee's Best Light.

- My knees crack more than the US economy.

- I find myself doing the whole "this place has changed so much" monologue... for Cheney, Spokane and Chewelah. It gets really sad when I drive by empty buildings and remember what business use to be in there.

- I like reading old newspaper articles.

- I quote John Wayne.

- 10:30 is getting a little late for me unless I'm at work.

- The highlight of my mornings is getting coffee.

- All I want to do is go fishing or hunting.

- Movies are too violent and have too much sex in them these days.

Chataqua 2008

Chewelah, the small town that I'm from, holds the same event every weekend after the 4th of July that is called Chataqua. Although after going to the event's website I noticed that I couldn't merely just show you a link of what this thing is all about.

Basically for three days, Chewelah becomes a full-out carnival with a bunch of craft booths and vendors all around our city park. Problem is, it's the same stuff every single year. There's always the guy that sells cork guns, the dude that sells sand art bottles, the weird lady that sells pipe cleaner animals and the homeless bum selling crack on the street corner.

Okay, I made that last one up.

But when you've lived in Chewelah for as long as I have (all my childhood), the event tends to loose it's luster after about the 10th year of the same stuff. So now, really I just got to Chataqua to do the follow...

1. See what people from my class got married.
2. See what people from my class got knocked up AND married.
3. See what people from my class for knocked up.
4. See what people from my class got fat but not knocked up.
5. See what people from my class got knocked up and got fat.

This year though, might be the one year I miss it because I have a friend's wedding to go to and a pesky thing I like to call "work." However, if the reading base at Just South of North would like to be part of the Chataqua experience, please shoot me an email or call me at (509) 209-1160 and encourage me to go to my hometown shindig, where I'll more than likely meet a bunch of people that I didn't really want to talk to anyways.

HOWEVER,

If I'm blogging about it and taking photos, it would make it so much better. And plus I'd just stop by the Chewelah Casino.

Highway driving

I got to take a trip up to my home town this weekend, which is about a 40 minute drive north of Spokane. There's something about highway driving in the remote area of Northeastern Washington that really gets you in a reflective mood.

Basically because if you break down, you're walking a looooong ways to civilization. To give you all insight into the wonders of rural highway driving I've constructed a timeline of my journey.

6:00 p.m.
I bid farewell to my trusty roommates. Weirdly enough, I hear celebrations after I step outside the door.

6:05 p.m.
Quick pit stop at a Cheney gas station. What's wonderful about my crappy college car is that people actually stare at me when I pull up to the gas pumps as if to say "you're really going to put 40 dollars worth of gas into a car that's worth 20 dollars?"

6:12
Ah, I-90, the only freeway on earth where you'll be forced to pass a tractor.

6:30
I'm in the depths of Spokane traffic, which means my speed slows down to roughly 45 mph through residential areas. While some people may ding the city for "not having anything culturally important" or "being less interesting than a reality TV show about the game of horseshoes", it's a whole hell of a lot better than the congestion on the west side of Washington. It takes nearly two hours to get to your nearest Starbucks, and those things are on every street corner.

6:39
Drop a CD off at the Spokane Arena for the Spokane Shock. The security guards there are nice. And I think they have guns. So I'm nice to them too.

6:50
And I'm officially outside of the Spokane city limits... which if you've been in north Spokane, you understand that this ends pretty abruptly. One minute you're in strip mall heaven, the next you're in the middle of a forest and Bigfoot is chasing your car.

7:00
Ah, Deer Park. Yeah never stop in this town.

7:15
The problem with a rural highway is the fact that it's only a two lane road, one lane for each direction. That means if you get stuck behind a PT Cruiser driven by a retiree who hasn't upgraded his "top speed" since the Great Depression, you're royally screwed.

7:20
What luck! A PT Cruiser in front of me.

7:30
You can't pass unless there's a long stretch of no oncoming traffic. The problem is, there's also a lot of turns on this highway.

7:45
Pass the PT Cruiser... and oh boy! A tractor pulling a large farming implement behind it that takes up rough 2/3 of the entire highway. And it's going 25 m.p.h.

8:00
I roll down the large hill that puts you into the Chewelah (or Coville, I'm not sure) valley. It's a wonderful view. You really get a good look at the Chewelah Casino as well.

8:15
After a brief stop in the Chewelah Safeway, I finally make it home. Home is eight miles outside of town, and I had to dodge a couple of small rodents on the road, and people.

8:30
The Lakers and Kobe lost to the Jazz... damn.