Eugene swings between silly and serious.
08.14 Edit This 0 Comments »
Byline: Bob Welch There are a number of famous people of this name including:
Ten years ago this week, in conjunction with the Eugene Celebration The Eugene Celebration is an annual community celebration and civic event held in downtown Eugene, Oregon, United States. Featuring bands and performers from throughout the Pacific Northwest, the three-day festival is held in early September and attracts more than 40,000 attendees , I wrote a piece suggesting that Eugene needed to lighten up. "Our collective shorts," I wrote, "are bunched too tight." Others agreed.
So, have we gotten more lighthearted or more serious in the past decade?
Undoubtedly, yes. Both.
We've made great progress - and none at all. Hey, this is Eugene. What did you expect? A unanimous decision?
We're bunching toward Humorah, I've concluded, while at the same time de-bunching the myth that we're just a collection of laid-back, pajama-clad revelers.
"We swing both directions to extremes and rarely settle for the middle, which is why most of us are nauseous nauseous /nau·seous/ (naw´shus) pertaining to or producing nausea.
nau·seous
adj.
1. Causing nausea.
2. Affected with nausea. all the time," says Leigh Anne Jasheway, a Eugene comic who won the 2003 Erma Bombeck Writing Competition. "At times, we're overly serious about things that could be treated with more levity lev·i·ty
n. pl. lev·i·ties
1. Lightness of manner or speech, especially when inappropriate; frivolity.
2. Inconstancy; changeableness.
3. The state or quality of being light; buoyancy. . Other times, like at the celebration, we put on a party like nobody on the planet."
The yes-and-no answer might seem like a cop-out, but you can't argue with hard evidence.
Signs that we're taking ourselves far too seriously: The University of Oregon The University of Oregon is a public university located in Eugene, Oregon. The university was founded in 1876, graduating its first class two years later. The University of Oregon is one of 60 members of the Association of American Universities. trying to make room for this sinister-looking Robo Duck. (We already have the whimsically wonderful Donald). A proliferation of "If You Aren't Angry You Aren't Paying Attention" bumper stickers. (Perhaps, but 24/7 anger gets us nowhere.) And letters to the editor more sharply barbed than I can remember in my 18 years here. (Whatever happened to catch-and-release social commentary instead of clubbing the opposition to death?)
"My sense is that Eugene residents haven't lost their sense of humor Noun 1. sense of humor - the trait of appreciating (and being able to express) the humorous; "she didn't appreciate my humor"; "you can't survive in the army without a sense of humor"
sense of humour, humor, humour , but that such humor has been tempered by the hard realities of a windless economy, unemployment, hunger and the million uncertainties of a post-Sept. 11 universe," says Paul Neville, who edits The Register-Guard's letters to the editor. "We're still humorous, even funny, but there's a new edge, a grimness."
In comparing humorous items on UO professors' doors from 1991 to 2001, I found eight of the Top 10 funniest departments had gotten more serious over the decade.
"I don't see evidence that we're taking ourselves any less seriously," says Dan Carlin car·line or car·lin
n. Scots
A woman, especially an old one.
[Middle English kerling, from Old Norse, from karl, man.] , KUGN's talk show host. "The people with the Chicken Little gene are driving the train right now, on both sides, left and right. Who can be anything but somber when the holier-than-thou types on both sides see you as shallow if you can't grasp the seriousness of the current situation?"
But just when you're ready to encourage Eugeneans to chill out, you consider the pro-light evidence: We're home to nationally respected humorists A humorist is a person who writes or performs humorous material. The material written and/or performed by humorists tends to be more subtle and cerebral than the material created by stand-up comedians and comedy writers. such as Jasheway and cartoonist Jan Eliot (who, by the way, thinks Eugene's funny bone is doing just fine). And to The Comic News, the only weekly all-humor magazine in America.
Our football team wears Easter Peep Yellow. The Eugene-Springfield chapter of the Institute of Management Accountants The Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) is a professional organization headquartered in Montvale, New Jersey consisting of over 70,000 members worldwide. The IMA is dedicated to advancing the role of the management accountant and financial manager within the business features "Eugene Accounting Humor" as the central point of its Web page, including how you identify a Eugene CPA (Computer Press Association, Landing, NJ) An earlier membership organization founded in 1983 that promoted excellence in computer journalism. Its annual awards honored outstanding examples in print, broadcast and electronic media. The CPA disbanded in 2000. at an accounting convention. (`The pinstripes on his suit run horizontally.')
"Does Eugene need to lighten up? Yes and no," Comic News owner Don Kahle says. "We laugh at ourselves, but in a wan, self-protective way. We're not willing to dig deep to the belly laugh that would tone our abs as well as an introductory membership at the DAC See D/A converter and discretionary access control.
DAC - Digital to Analog Converter ."
Ten years from now, if we check Eugene's humor pulse, let's hope it's even stronger.
"The ability to laugh means you don't take yourself too seriously," says Jesse Springer, author of the cartoon book "Only in Eugene." "And it's when you take yourself too seriously that a place gets into polarities."
And that shorts get in a bunch.
Bob Welch can be reached at 338-2354 or at bwelch@guardnet.com.
- Bob Welch (musician)
- Bob Welch (baseball player)
Ten years ago this week, in conjunction with the Eugene Celebration The Eugene Celebration is an annual community celebration and civic event held in downtown Eugene, Oregon, United States. Featuring bands and performers from throughout the Pacific Northwest, the three-day festival is held in early September and attracts more than 40,000 attendees , I wrote a piece suggesting that Eugene needed to lighten up. "Our collective shorts," I wrote, "are bunched too tight." Others agreed.
So, have we gotten more lighthearted or more serious in the past decade?
Undoubtedly, yes. Both.
We've made great progress - and none at all. Hey, this is Eugene. What did you expect? A unanimous decision?
We're bunching toward Humorah, I've concluded, while at the same time de-bunching the myth that we're just a collection of laid-back, pajama-clad revelers.
"We swing both directions to extremes and rarely settle for the middle, which is why most of us are nauseous nauseous /nau·seous/ (naw´shus) pertaining to or producing nausea.
nau·seous
adj.
1. Causing nausea.
2. Affected with nausea. all the time," says Leigh Anne Jasheway, a Eugene comic who won the 2003 Erma Bombeck Writing Competition. "At times, we're overly serious about things that could be treated with more levity lev·i·ty
n. pl. lev·i·ties
1. Lightness of manner or speech, especially when inappropriate; frivolity.
2. Inconstancy; changeableness.
3. The state or quality of being light; buoyancy. . Other times, like at the celebration, we put on a party like nobody on the planet."
The yes-and-no answer might seem like a cop-out, but you can't argue with hard evidence.
Signs that we're taking ourselves far too seriously: The University of Oregon The University of Oregon is a public university located in Eugene, Oregon. The university was founded in 1876, graduating its first class two years later. The University of Oregon is one of 60 members of the Association of American Universities. trying to make room for this sinister-looking Robo Duck. (We already have the whimsically wonderful Donald). A proliferation of "If You Aren't Angry You Aren't Paying Attention" bumper stickers. (Perhaps, but 24/7 anger gets us nowhere.) And letters to the editor more sharply barbed than I can remember in my 18 years here. (Whatever happened to catch-and-release social commentary instead of clubbing the opposition to death?)
"My sense is that Eugene residents haven't lost their sense of humor Noun 1. sense of humor - the trait of appreciating (and being able to express) the humorous; "she didn't appreciate my humor"; "you can't survive in the army without a sense of humor"
sense of humour, humor, humour , but that such humor has been tempered by the hard realities of a windless economy, unemployment, hunger and the million uncertainties of a post-Sept. 11 universe," says Paul Neville, who edits The Register-Guard's letters to the editor. "We're still humorous, even funny, but there's a new edge, a grimness."
In comparing humorous items on UO professors' doors from 1991 to 2001, I found eight of the Top 10 funniest departments had gotten more serious over the decade.
"I don't see evidence that we're taking ourselves any less seriously," says Dan Carlin car·line or car·lin
n. Scots
A woman, especially an old one.
[Middle English kerling, from Old Norse, from karl, man.] , KUGN's talk show host. "The people with the Chicken Little gene are driving the train right now, on both sides, left and right. Who can be anything but somber when the holier-than-thou types on both sides see you as shallow if you can't grasp the seriousness of the current situation?"
But just when you're ready to encourage Eugeneans to chill out, you consider the pro-light evidence: We're home to nationally respected humorists A humorist is a person who writes or performs humorous material. The material written and/or performed by humorists tends to be more subtle and cerebral than the material created by stand-up comedians and comedy writers. such as Jasheway and cartoonist Jan Eliot (who, by the way, thinks Eugene's funny bone is doing just fine). And to The Comic News, the only weekly all-humor magazine in America.
Our football team wears Easter Peep Yellow. The Eugene-Springfield chapter of the Institute of Management Accountants The Institute of Management Accountants (IMA) is a professional organization headquartered in Montvale, New Jersey consisting of over 70,000 members worldwide. The IMA is dedicated to advancing the role of the management accountant and financial manager within the business features "Eugene Accounting Humor" as the central point of its Web page, including how you identify a Eugene CPA (Computer Press Association, Landing, NJ) An earlier membership organization founded in 1983 that promoted excellence in computer journalism. Its annual awards honored outstanding examples in print, broadcast and electronic media. The CPA disbanded in 2000. at an accounting convention. (`The pinstripes on his suit run horizontally.')
"Does Eugene need to lighten up? Yes and no," Comic News owner Don Kahle says. "We laugh at ourselves, but in a wan, self-protective way. We're not willing to dig deep to the belly laugh that would tone our abs as well as an introductory membership at the DAC See D/A converter and discretionary access control.
DAC - Digital to Analog Converter ."
Ten years from now, if we check Eugene's humor pulse, let's hope it's even stronger.
"The ability to laugh means you don't take yourself too seriously," says Jesse Springer, author of the cartoon book "Only in Eugene." "And it's when you take yourself too seriously that a place gets into polarities."
And that shorts get in a bunch.
Bob Welch can be reached at 338-2354 or at bwelch@guardnet.com.
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