The Thread

[niceguy2005]

They are the Texas state rodent. In some parts of the state they are everywhere.

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

They are the Texas state rodent. In some parts of the state they are everywhere.

Certainly every where around here (near Dallas)...

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

They are the Texas state rodent. In some parts of the state they are everywhere.

BTW, some years back, the students at University of Texas voted to change their mascot from the Longhorns to the Armadillos. The Board of Trustees vetoed the vote.

I guess the male students decided that having steers represent them wasn't terribly masculine...[:'(][:D]

[niceguy2005]

Yeah, but the fighting armadillos doesn't really strike fear into the hearts of opponenets either. They'd have to replace "hook 'em horns" with "role up into a ball and get eaten"

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

Yeah, but the fighting armadillos doesn't really strike fear into the hearts of opponenets either. They'd have to replace "hook 'em horns" with "role up into a ball and get eaten"

Works for me! Of course, i went to a rival university (the perennial whipping boy of Southwest Conference, when there used to be one.)

[niceguy2005]

Let me think...would that be TCU or Texas Tech?

[Speedysteve]

Are they that much of a pest?!? Armadillo's that is.........

P.S. Rtrapasso your 'alpha' dog sounds wicked. "Bark. Bark. Bark." Threat comes nearer....dog retreats indoors to find adult whilst threat moves nearer to deal with barking dog [:D]

Reminds me of a guy I work with. His dog (Black Labrador called Spike. Very cute) is not very guard like to say the least. Anyhow. Guy at work had planted more grass seed in back garden. One day he notices a Pheasant is our there eating at his grass seed! Back door is opened. Spike sits there. "Go on Spike get the bird. Kill!" Spike looks up at work colleague with loving eyes. "Spike get the **$*%£$^*£* bird". Spike continues to sit there. Work mate has to get shoes on and chase bird away.

Moral of the story:

Get a dog which can be a guard dog also.

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

Let me think...would that be TCU or Texas Tech?

Not TCU. When i was going to school, Texas Tech was a powerhouse! I *think* they were rated #6 in the country when we played them my last year (i know they were in the top twenty...) Of course, this was in the early 70's... No, my school was even smaller than these two. We did stand a fair chance of beating TCU some years (but it wasn't a sure bet).

Here's another clue: we were the only other school with TCU in the conference a few years back NOT disqualified for the championship due to recruitment scandals, so we had a 50/50 chance to take the championship (but didn't). This was shortly before the conference was disbanded, i think.

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: Speedy

Are they that much of a pest?!? Armadillo's that is.........

P.S. Rtrapasso your 'alpha' dog sounds wicked. "Bark. Bark. Bark." Threat comes nearer....dog retreats indoors to find adult whilst threat moves nearer to deal with barking dog [:D]

Reminds me of a guy I work with. His dog (Black Labrador called Spike. Very cute) is not very guard like to say the least. Anyhow. Guy at work had planted more grass seed in back garden. One day he notices a Pheasant is our there eating at his grass seed! Back door is opened. Spike sits there. "Go on Spike get the bird. Kill!" Spike looks up at work colleague with loving eyes. "Spike get the **$*%£$^*£* bird". Spike continues to sit there. Work mate has to get shoes on and chase bird away.

Moral of the story:

Get a dog which can be a guard dog also.

Well, the male dog takes his job of guarding VERY seriously. We have an octagonal room with a window seat and he has about 270 degrees of visibility around, and he spends most of his time watching, or guarding the back yard from squirrels (and armadillos). He will go after the armadillos, but AFAIK they have stymied him be either being quick to get out of the yard, or quick to wedge themselves into somewhere that he can't get at them very well.

The alpha female will come running to help bark at stuff when he is at the window once he sounds the alarm. She also likes to chase squirrels, but nothing larger than that. If an armadillo shows up, she usually comes to get us and leaves the male to deal with it, or she will bark at it from a distance if she is feeling exceptionally brave (and if the male dog is between her and the armadillo). She is very unusual in many respects, and we have a small sign saying "Warning: Strange Dog" that we found appropriate.

[niceguy2005]

Hmmm, let me think. Recruiting scandals would leave out SMU and A&M. I don't think Rice was in the SW conference. Baylor?

[niceguy2005]

ORIGINAL: rtrapasso

ORIGINAL: Speedy

we have a small sign saying "Warning: Strange Dog" that we found appropriate.

I'm seeing a biz plan to sell signs like this over the net. I need one that say, "Warning: neurotic dog."

[Speedysteve]

LOL Robert [:D]

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

Hmmm, let me think. Recruiting scandals would leave out SMU and A&M. I don't think Rice was in the SW conference. Baylor?

Rice WAS in the SWC, and was where i went to undergrad school. I am not sure i remember who were all the teams in the SWC, but there was Texas, Texas Tech, Arkansas, University of Houston (admitted late), Texas A&M, Baylor, SMU, TCU, and Rice. Of course, we also played some non-conference teams, and we were a very popular team to have play at various homecoming games for the other side (thus assuring a lopsided victory and glowing feelings among the other universities Alum.) If we were lucky, we might have TCU come to our homecoming, but even then it was iffy.

It was a rather rough conference for us - i think in my last year, of the 11 teams that we played, 8 were in the top 20 when we played them...[8|][X(]


EDIT: from posts below, i can see i need to clarify this: use of WE in this means the school (in general), not me personally!![:o]

[rtrapasso]

i tried to find a reference to the W-L of the 70's and came up with this:

"As for the football team, it set a record in late 2005 by losing its 14th consecutive game. This streak - the longest active in college football at the time ..."

Glad(?) to see we are keeping up the tradition...[8|][:D]

BTW, there is also this:

"The Rice baseball team won the College World Series in 2003, blasting Stanford 14-2 in the final game. Because of the academic quality of the two finalists, the series earned nicknames such as the "RBIs and SATs Series." The victory made Rice University the smallest school in 51 years to win a national championship at the highest collegiate level of the sport. This is Rice's only national championship in a team sport."

[rtrapasso]

News Flash: i was wrong when i said Rice lost the 50/50 chance at becoming conference champions - apparently they beat TCU somewhere along the line, as they were 1994 SWC football champions! This alone probably did in the conference![:'(]

Hoo-hah! and i only found out about it 12 years later... i guess they didn't flaunt it too much as it was pretty much a coin-toss between the two bottom teams in the conference... but the only ones that were eligible to win..,[:D]

[niceguy2005]

Well Robert, you have my respect. While Rice may not have dominated college football, it is an outstanding academic school, who also managed to field some respectable teams all things considered. I went to a number of Owls games as a kid growing up in Houston in the 70's. I may have seen you play. What position did you play?

[Mynok]

EDIT: (It would help to read the last page before posting something redundant like I just tried do. [:(])

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: niceguy2005

Well Robert, you have my respect. While Rice may not have dominated college football, it is an outstanding academic school, who also managed to field some respectable teams all things considered. I went to a number of Owls games as a kid growing up in Houston in the 70's. I may have seen you play. What position did you play?

No, no, no!! i did not play (and i am sorry if i gave that impression) - i merely cheered them on, and many of them lived across the hall, etc. i used to be really interested in football in general, but once players started topping $1 mill/year for salaries, i thought it was no longer a game. College football also kind of lost my respect due to the massive cheating scandals that (i think) led to the demise of the SWC...

You are correct, though, about the respectable quality of Rice teams. i was just looking for records and found a big website that has all the college football team records dating back years and years. It also runs a statistical analysis on who are the best teams, by analyzing win/loss ratios, and by the difficulty in schedules. To my surprise, Rice actually rated #1 for two years: 1977 and 1979 if you do the "schedule" method. Not that you'd know it by looking at the win-loss ratio: 1/10/0 both years. i guess that goes to show how you can lie with statistics!!![:D]

BTW - i was in Houston until Aug 1973, so i guess it was possible we could have crossed paths...

[niceguy2005]

Rice, as I recall was a great football team decades ago, maybe back in the 30's or 40's. That was back in the day of the real student athelete. Now college teams are nothing more than the minor leagues for the pros and Univesities jump on those cash cows.

I find it somewhat amazing that people slam pro football players for being mercenaries. Yet, from my point of view, they aren't guilty of anything more than being gifted athletes and capitalists. Its the colleges that amaze me. They cash in on the students and often fail to uphold reasonable academic standards for them. [:-]

[niceguy2005]

Only 91 posts to go. I have a new goal of that fifth star by Friday.[8D]