Aggressive Gobbling

TigerBlog lives in a fairly country-ish place.

He has, for instance, way more deer who wander by than people. And foxes. You could hold the squirrel Olympics near his house. 

The visitors he saw Sunday morning, though, were a bit unfamiliar.

Here they are: 

Were they lost? It's possible, since they came right up to the window as if they had something they wanted to ask.

TigerBlog decided to try to get a picture of them that didn't include the window screen. Turns out these guys are much more skittish than your average deer, or at least the deer who come around TB's place, the ones he feeds canned corn (they seem to like it).

Also, the turkeys were also a bit meaner. This is about as close as TB could get:

Then they gobbled at TB. It was really aggressive gobbling too. Frighteningly aggressive gobbling at that.

Then they scurried away. 

Oh well. It was nice to see them. 

Ben Franklin wanted the turkey to be the national bird. Perhaps if that happened, then every team nicknamed "Eagles" would be nicknamed "Turkeys."

Could Princeton somehow have ended up as the Turkeys back when its nickname evolved in the 1880s? The moniker "Tigers" came from a description of a team that was "fighting like Tigers." Maybe it would have been "running like Turkeys" if turkeys could have been more venerable. 

Speaking of aggressive gobbling — which may be TB's new favorite phrase — TigerBlog found himself on the Texas A&M athletic site yesterday. His main interest was the women's track and field page, but before he could get there, he was greeted by the story of the baseball team's comeback against South Carolina Sunday.

How's this for a comeback? Texas A&M trailed 12-2 in the sixth and 12-7 into the bottom of the ninth. And then what happened? The Aggies loaded the bases, blasted a grand slam, loaded the bases again and then blasted another grand slam. Has that ever happened before?

Click HERE to see the startled look on the South Carolina catcher's face as the game-winner was launched. And look at the look at the face of the batter. Is that aggressive gobbling or what? 

After that diversion, TB finally made it to the track and field page. His interest was the recent 44 Farms Invitational that Texas A&M hosted. 

Specifically, there was Princeton junior Tessa Mudd, who set the Ivy League record in the pole vault while in College Station. Her vault was 4.38m/14-4.5. Whose record did she break? Her own.

Mudd tied for fourth in the event. Where did her vault rank her in the NCAA so far this spring? 

TigerBlog went to the NCAA website to see and found that there is a ranking for the East and one for the West. When he looked, he saw that Mudd's 4.38m was nowhere near the top. In fact, it was nowhere anywhere.

Then he realized he was looking at the high jump, not the pole vault. He was also looking at the wrong column, which was feet instead of meters. 

As it turned out, Mudd is tied for third so far among vaulters in the East. Mudd, who finished 13th indoors at the NCAA championship last year, has won four Ivy titles between indoor and outdoor already. 

Mudd was not the only Tiger to put her name on the list of Eastern leaders at the 44 Farms. Georgina Scoot, her classmate, is also ranked third, in her case in the triple jump, while Shea Green is fifth in the javelin. 

Scoot is also 17th in the long jump. 

Princeton had two athletes make the list in the heptathlon, with Mirtel Klaar 13th and Shantell Kwofie 22nd after their performances in Texas.

Who else from Princeton women's team is ranked highly? 

Mena Scratchard is seventh in the 5,000, and Alexis Allen is 10th in TB's favorite event, the 3,000-meter steeplechase. 

Angela McAuslan-Kelly is 12th in the hammer; Siniru Iheoma is 13th in the discus. 

Oh, and do you remember the famous episode of "WKRP In Cincinnati?" 

If you do, then you get the reference.