Eastern Oregon was the spot where my career started back in 1932. It’s been a while, now, but I still enjoy going back occasionally to see old friends and, obviously, attend a rodeo.

Each year, the population of Pendleton swells from about 15,000 to more than 75,000 as cow gentlemen from across the country rope various animals during the Pendleton Round-Up. It’s become a tourist hot spot. You could call the Roundup stadium the Times Square of Eastern Oregon. You could do that, but you’d get a lot of angry stares from snap-button-shirt-clad fans who don’t much cotton to people from the East Coast.

I flew into Portland the other day and rode a bus out to the rental car center. On the bus were three separate couples speaking German. Germans, you see, love the Pacific Northwest. It’s been a while since my German minor, but if I understood them correctly, they were all plotting to annex the airport’s Terminal C.

It’s a three hour drive from Portland to Pendleton, so on the way out, I recalled some of the things that infuriated me about Oregon back in the day.

Now, I looked back on them nostalgically, like the way speed limit signs in Oregon just say, “Speed.” Back in the olden days, I’d complain about the Pacific Northwest struggling with a pandemic of drivers who camp in the left lane and drive slowly.

“Come on,” I’d mutter. “It doesn’t say ‘limit.’ That’s not the fastest you can go. That’s how fast you’re supposed to go!”

But now, I kind of liked the slower pace, muttering, “Why do people in Texas have to be in such a hurry? Oh no. I’ve become one of them! But wait, shouldn’t I have become one of them when I lived here instead of seven years later?”

I hit the word, “them,” both times.

I then had to stop for gas. In Oregon, you’re not allowed to pump your own gas. I learned this by hopping out of my car when I first moved there, swiping my credit card and having some guy run up to me yelling, “Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!”

So I pulled into a station and a woman who looked to be about 75 years old came out and pumped my gas. I’m glad I knew not to try to pump my own gas this time. Getting out of the car and having an elderly women explain that she, and she alone, was qualified to pump my gas would have felt a little emasculating.

On the way out, I did what any tourist would do heading to Times Square: stopped at the other attractions.

On the way to Times Square West, that includes a trip to Hat Rock. Hat Rock got its name during the Lewis and Clark expedition.

The two kept a diary as they made their way to the West Coast. On the Columbia River, Lewis was, I imagine, scribbling some notes about salmon in the diary one day, when Clark, completely drunk and with his tri-corner hat on crooked, stumbled up to the front of the canoe, grabbed Lewis’ shoulder and said, “Hey. HEY! Look at that rock! That rock looks my hat!”

Lewis shook his head, but then looked thoughtfully out into the distance and still wrote it down.

I arrived at the rodeo a few hours before it started on Saturday. I’ve previously attended with my first boss out of college. He acted as a mentor at the beginning of my career, so the fact that you’re now wasting time reading this blog is all his fault.

He was attending with his son, who is now old enough to drink at a bar before the rodeo starts, which made me feel like I’ve aged over those seven years since I worked in Oregon.

We made our way to the Round-Up, stopping at some of the souvenir stands along the way.

At one of the stands, Jeff’s son convinced him to get his cowboy hat detailed.

“Oh, good, you can get your hat steamed by Wilford Brimley,” I said.

“Man, you are from the East Coast,” Jeff shot back. “It’s not called ‘steaming.’ It’s called ‘shaping.'”

At the Round-Up, I would notice a man near us wearing a shirt with a Canadian flag but an American flag bandanna.

“Unity,” I thought to myself.

Jeff would then roll his eyes at me. Again.

In conclusion, Oregon apparently just passed a law that lets people in some areas pump their own gas some of the time.

It really is a progressive state.