Home
Up

“It’s one thing to have a chicken as your mascot, but to have female one at that?!”

                                                            -Bob W.                                             

THE INTRO: 

Seriously, when they named the Blue Hens, what was it like in the room that day:

Distinguished Alumni 1:  OK, we need to come up with a mascot for our school.  We need something that Delaware is famous for.  Can anyone think of anything?

Distinguished Alumni 2:  We’ll we don’t have sales tax, we can call ourselves the “No Sales Taxers” or maybe the “Cheap Shoppers”??

Alumni 1:  Yeah, those are great ideas and all, but I’m looking for something, oh I don’t know, something a little different.

Distinguished Alumni 3:  How about slots?  We are famous for slots!  I can see it now.  Ladies and Gentleman please welcome your University of Delaware Slots.  Or even better, we can make it two syllables and call them the “Hot Slots!”. 

Distinguished Alumni 4 (under his breath):  Or how about the “Dirty Slots” he he he.

DA1 (slamming the gavel):  Okay enough, we need some order.  We can’t go with Slots because this conversation is taking place in the past before Delaware had slots, so we can’t be famous for that.  How about this, we are the first state right?  Why don’t we go with the “First Staters” or maybe even “The state that signed the Constitution First because they quickly realized they had no chance of sustaining themselves without being a part of a much larger nation?”.

DA2:  We’ll it’s true, but don’t you think it’s a little wordy?

Distinguised Alumni 5 (placing a chicken on the table):  Gentlemen I have your answer.  We are famous for producing chicken.  Sussex County produces more broilers than any other county in the US (even though it is roughly the size of Wicomico, Worcester, and Somerset which combined would easily out produce Sussex).  We should go with the Chickens.

DA1:  Oh I like that, but is a chicken a good mascot?  Isn’t that a little, you know… wimpy? 

DA5:  Well yeah, but for a state known for shopping, being small, and having an industry fueled entirely by 80 year old blue haired woman, I think it’s appropriate.  In fact I think it’s too ferocious. 

DA1:  Good point, it is a little fierce.  Let’s tone it down some and make it a hen.  So Blue Hens it is.  Any objections (silence) good, then it’s settled, just in time too since we all have to get home to our life partners down in Rehobeth this afternoon.

Sorry, about that aside, but I have to start off the year right.  Anyway, this game is not your typical first game of the season.  In fact I’m pretty excited about it.  It has a little more too it than say a Western Michigan game, or even a Northern Illinois game (even though NIU was a pretty strong team).  This one has regional interest and I think it needs to be exploited a little bit more. Even though UD is Div 1AA (or whatever the hell they call it now) they have a pretty loyal fan base and driving from Newark to College Park isn’t really that much of a trip.  It should be quite lively. Plus Delaware can field a competitive team.  In fact if we were playing the 2007 Blue Hens I might even be a little nervous.  There QB got drafted in the first round (I think) and on the flip side as I’m writing this, I’m not even sure who are QB is going to be?

But what also makes this one interesting is that it is the first game of the year.  We will see who won the QB battle, we will see if they are going to keep the position.  We’ll get a first look at the newbies, but most importantly, we will have our first chance to all be together and drink.  And after all, that is what is most important.  Of course winning this game is pretty important as well, being that we have Cal looming early in the schedule and it would be nice to start of the year strong.  But then again, as I sit here thinking, the years we lost to NIU to open the season, and the year we lost to Notre Dame to start the season, both turned out to be pretty big years.  So I take that back, the tailgating is the most important part of the day. 

Regardless of the reason, I really can’t wait for this one.  Remember how when we were kids and you would count down the days until Christmas, then you got older, and then you got married, and then you have kids, and now December 23^rd rolls around and you are like “Holy $#$%, Christmas is in 2 days!!”.  This first game reminds me of Christmas, not the adult version, but more like young Christmas, you know like the year when the Atari 2600 came out.  Needless to say I can’t wait!!

But enough jabbering, let’s take a look at the Tailgating Forecast for the day:

THE HISTORY:

We are lucky enough to open up the 2008 season in “scenic” College Park (Can you think of any other State that put their main University in the most unattractive part of the state, It’d be like U of Illinois putting up their main campus in East St. Louis or something!), anyway we are at home for this game, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure that Washington DC in August equals less than ideal tailgating conditions.  But let’s look at some past history for the area. 

The average high in Washington DC for August 30^th is 84 F.  The average low is 66F.  The record high for that date was 99 F set in 1953 (YEAH National Championship Year!!), and the record low is 50 F set in 1986.    Now normally the University has been taking care of us by putting the first few games at a 6:00 start so that the sun is on the way down as the game kicks off.  This was great, but apparently not great enough for the idea to stick because the kickoff time for the Delaware game is scheduled for 3:00.  Though many people mistakenly associate the hottest time of the day as noon, this is hardly the case.  In fact this is about the worst start time you can get for an August game, but there is nothing we can do about it now.  At least it will be equally hot for both teams.  So let’s take a look at the forecast.

THE FORECAST:

Looking at the August 30^th forecast from the Farmers Almanac I’m not getting much help.  The forecast says “Fair Skies” so though that does rule out rain, it doesn’t give us much indication for the temperature.  In past years it has been so hot and dry that choosing the high for the early season games was pretty easy, go for the over.  But this summer has been weird in the sense that it’s been normal.  Sure Al Gore would like it to be 100F with no rain in sight so he could sell more movies, but this is a pretty regular summer season.  And because of such, I’m going to stick around the average for the high.  The only real concern I have is the rain.  I’m not going to call for any, but we’ve been getting a pretty steady rain this summer so I can’t write it off as easily as I could, say at this time last year.  But it is just that I have a hard time calling for rain in August.  So here we go:

The forecast for the August 30^th “Kicking the Chicken” Game is looking for some rather seasonalable weather.  That’s the good news, the bad news is that the season is summer, and not fall.  The high should be in the mid 80’s.  I’m going with 86F.  And the low, who thanks to the kick off time we won’t have to worry about at all will be around 64F.  The start of the Tailgate (Remember People that would be 9:00 am) will be rather nice, but the temperature will quickly build throughout the day.  The winds should be somewhat noticeable, but not a major story with gusts maybe threatening double digits, nothing that would knock over plates or add an X-factor to flip cup.  And again, I’m not calling for any rain, just some high clouds to break up the blue sky and to occasionally give us a break from the August sun.  So to recap High 86, Low 64, no rain and only a slight to noticeable breeze.

CODE RED- The sunburn code red is back.  With this start time, combined with the time of year, if you don’t lube up, you will regret it.

The game day sunrise for College Park (or DC technically) on August 30, 2008 is 6:35 AM.  The sunset should be around 7:40 PM. 

As for the moon, it will be 0% full, or more accurately a New Moon.  If you could see it,  (and if you pick it out during the tailgate, you will win a free beer courtesy of the D7 Weather Desk) will rise at 6:16 AM and set at 7:31 PM.  Not too much different than the sun actually.        

THE HURRICANE REPORT:

Hmmm this could be interesting.  As I write this we have already had a named Hurricane in the Atlantic, so the possibility is certainly there.  But the farmers Almanac, who loves to predict Hurricanes by they way, has us sitting high and dry.  So I’m going to lower the Hurricane Watch down into the minimal zone, but still keep an eye on things.  I also need to check to see when J’s trip to Myrtle Beach is because it seems like every week he is down there, there usually is some type of Tropical Activity in the vicinity.  Also last year we debuted the Hurricane Report during one of the most inactive tropical seasons we have had in a while, so we’ll have to see if Mother Nature is looking to bounce back.  My overall Tropical forecast for the year is for activity to be slightly below normal.  This means we should probably be safe (with that guarantee, maybe you should stock up on ice, bottled water, and shingles).  This games Hurricane Ranking is Heyward-Bey.  Or for those not fans of the Program, 8.    

. 

THE SNOW REPORT:

Closed for the Season.

With the record low for the date being 50, I think we’ll have a few weeks before we break open this section.  By they way, I’m liking the end of November game up in BC.  Could this finally be the year Maryland plays in the snow??

THE X-FACTOR: 

Just to show you some extremes that could happen and have happened on this particular date in weather history. 

• 1776 - General Washington took advantage of a heavy fog to evacuate Long Island after a defeat. Adverse winds kept the British fleet from intervening. (David Ludlum)
• 1839 - A hurricane moved from Cape Hatteras NC to offshore New England. An unusual feature of the hurricane was the snow it helped produce, which whitened the Catskill Mountains of New York State. Considerable snow was also reported at Salem NY. (The Weather Channel)
• 1982 - A tropical depression brought torrential rains to portions of southern Texas. Up to twelve inches fell south of Houston, and as much as eighteen inches fell southeast of Austin. The tropical depression spawned fourteen tornadoes in three days. (David Ludlum) Record cold gripped the northeastern U.S. Thirty-one cities in New England reported record lows, and areas of Vermont received up to three inches of snow. (The Weather Channel)
• 1987 - Eight cities in California and Oregon reported record high temperatures for the date, including Redding CA and Sacramento CA where the mercury hit 100 degrees. (The National Weather Summary)
• 1988 - Thunderstorms drenched Georgia and the Carolinas with heavy rain, soaking Columbia, SC, with 4.10 inches in three hours. Fresno CA was the hot spot in the nation with a record high of 109 degrees. Duluth MN tied their record for the month of August with a morning low of 39 degrees. (The National Weather Summary)
• 1989 - Thunderstorms developing ahead of a cold front produced large hail in Montana and North Dakota during the evening and early nighttime hours. Hail three inches in diameter was reported 20 miles south of Medora ND, and thunderstorms over Dawson County MT produced up to three inches of rain. Thunderstorms produced golf ball size hail at Roundup MT, Dazey ND and Protection KS. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)

***This is a disclaimer to remove all responsibility on myself if this forecast is wrong.  Being that it is very difficult to predict the weather greater than 48 hours in advance, the odds of needing this disclaimer are about 100%.  However I do believe this forecast will be pretty close to what we can actually look to expect.