You May Be From Oregon If You…

I do have friends and in-laws who live in Oregon. Perhaps they'll get a chuckle out of this reminder.

You May Be From Oregon If You…

• You've used a pick-up line involving the quality of your compost pile.
• You've eaten in an Eastern Oregon diner whose wall hangings include a bull emasculator.
• You've never owned an umbrella.
• You've named a child Autzen or Reser.
• You've eaten clam chowder while watching a boat crew gut ling cod on the docks below.
• You know more than a dozen names for rain.
• You find yourself defending the socially redeeming value of "Animal House."
• You know who Walter Umenhofer is.
• Fully clothed and smelling of dry sweat, you've slept with a total stranger on the floor of a van during the Hood-to-Coast Relay.
• You remember where you were on Columbus Day 1962.
• You can tell the difference between black olives and elk scat.
• You know the significance of 0-0.
• You doubt the existence of God but believe, unequivocally, in Bigfoot.
• Your fingers occasionally turn purple on late-summer evenings from picking blackberries.
• You've sat next to a guy wearing a tux at the Hult Center while in the same jeans you wore to the top of Mount Pisgah that afternoon.
• You've already forgotten how long last winter was but remember your REI member number and Nick Symmonds' 200 splits in last summer's Olympic Trials 800.
• You've melted a lawn chair during a windy beach fire.
• You have a master's in sociology, which, in your job, helps you understand the cultural differences between those who order ventis, grandes and talls.
• You've played golf on a day so wet that the cups literally runneth over.
• You've never tried to pet or pick up a baby seal.
• The back of your car features a bike rack, trailer hitch and/or multiple political stickers from presidential races that were contested more than a decade ago.
• While fishing, you use recycled java jackets to keep your salmon eggs warm.
• You've Googled, blogged or Twittered about remedies for poison oak.
• You find a briefcase too cumbersome to take to work, but gladly hang your bike on the ceiling of your office.
• You're convinced "Louie, Louie" is the state song.
• You've sat through a rainy Civil War football game while wearing a Glad trash bag.
• You've drunk a microbrew with a fisher poet in Astoria.
• You've worn rafting sandals to a wedding—your own.
• You've burned grass seed fields or written letters protesting the burning of grass seed fields.
• You've stayed in an Eastern Oregon motel that includes signs warning guests not to clean their deer on the beds.