Living in western Maryland can be a battle with tedium, unless you have a substantial amount of Krumpe's DoNuts and some fantastic friends to share them with you. Collecting a group of those friends takes a long time, but it is well worth it. Fantastic friends are the kind of folk who call you up and say, "Wanna toss some buffalo chips?"

The correct response to this is "How many of us can we fit in Tim's car?"

So, on a moist spring day in 1996, four friends and I trekked out to Catoctin State Park to participate in the annual Buffalo Chip Tossing Contest. None of us had much of a skill base in this unique sport, but that wasn't going to stop us. Hell, it was a day out, and we were psyched to sling turd in the name of adventure.

We made it in time to register and have a look at the competition. It would not be easy; there were definitely old pros out on this day. Some of these folk even had special team baseball hats. There were also youngsters here, laughing and carrying on. Humph. We took this in stride and kept our good humor, until we needed to declare a name for our team.

Thinking in a warped and very Gen X, stream-of-consciousness way, we morphed the "chips" motif to "CHiPs", the unforgettable 70s police drama starring Erik Estrada, and, yeah, that other guy. From there, as if in a flash of a television tube blowing up, the name "Ponch-n-Johns" sprang to mind. And thus we were, surrounded by other teams averaging +/- 15 years of our ages, sporting a name no-one but we found hilarious.

Our fearless leader and bullhorn man, Mr. Park Ranger, gathered us out on the sodden lawns outside of the beachfront. He had on this lovely 70s Tupperware hued uniform with supporting belt. And, yeah, a hat which boldly displayed in gold capital letters, RANGER. I really wanted that hat.

Mr. Park Ranger introduced the key players of the sport. His lovely assistants, mainly two women of indeterminate age, dragged an ominous black trash bag across the grass towards us and bade us each grab a chip. Well, can I tell you, these humid moist beasties were an eerie pleasure to hold. Warm, yet firm, with only the slightest odor. In the proper hand, one of these babies could soar across the park. Mine would not be the proper hand. (But let's not spoil the story with such sadness.)

Mr. Park Ranger then told us the rules: We would get two chances and two chances only at each of three tests.

The first test...Each member of our team had to throw his or her chip for distance. This was considered the simplest of tests, since it merely required letting fly one of these pups somewhere in the direction in front of you. Well, when you consider the principle of the thing, there certainly are several solutions to this challenge.

One of our team members managed to place in this round, having sent his chip sailing down the lawn to the beach. This would aid our score greatly. Needless to say, my first went up over my head, since it stuck to my thumb on the release. My friends claim that there, in a loving family environment, I yelled "F__k!" to be heard across the lake. I categorically deny this. OK, well, I have no recollection, therefore I can deny this. But my dearest friends have pointed out to me that in this picture, I am apparently forming the letter F on my lips as my arm attempts to Pete Townsend off of my body. All I can say is phooey.

The next test was for accuracy. Chip throwing enthusiasm was no match for the difficulty of this maneuver: toss a chip squarely into the "big tin wash basin on the rock." Bwa-ha! Try as we might, many of us didn't even hit the rock. We were laughing so hard, I can't recall if any of us did manage it. But I do know members of The Hats team did, and we were sore about that.

The last test was the hardest--the test of force and strength. Could a living human cause a once living, presently festering, pile of vegetation to knock over a helpless bottle of water "on a stump". Ho ho. Try as we might, this was definitely tough. Mr. Park Ranger Man even let us shorter folk stand up a little closer. Some of us did manage to whack the bottle a bit. This would help our score. However, since the bratty kids were in the "shorter folk" category, some of them managed a good whack at the bottle as well.

Well, after the last event, we were forced to relinquish our friends the buffalo chips to their sultry habitat and await the scores. We grabbed some refreshment and spoke of harrowing trials and fatigue, "We gave it our all", etc.. Surrounded by old pros whose skill at the game was impressive, (dare we say, inspiring?), would prove to rattle our confidence. The wait was agonizing. Screaming kids running around with dripping ice cream would only add to our growing anxiety, especially since many of them were the competition. Could the Ponch-n-Johns come through and score a small victory for the Gen Xers?

Mr. Park Ranger Man, bullhorn in hand, announced the winners. His lovely assistants hurriedly scribbled with large Magic Markers. Third Place......wasn't us. Oh, bummer. We sucked so hard that The Brats beat us. Maybe some of them are lactose intolerant and barf up their ice cream. Hard as we wished, no such luck. So, we waited to hear about the winners. But then, much to our complete shock and surprise, Mr. Park Ranger Man called out that we took second place! He beamed! We screamed! Victory was ours, oh yes!

And how confused was the Magic Marker woman who had to fit "Second Place: Ponch-n-Johns" onto the manila orange buffalo flag which was to be our medal.