The mountain standing in my path to euphoria

I've been living in Salt Lake for almost 7 months now and basically...I'm loving every minute of it!

My job at the museum is awesome. I work with great people on a subject I love.

I get to see this beautiful site every single day.
I live in a nice apartment (no picture for safety reasons. You understand :) ).

I have awesome roommates. (me and Hailey)
I live at the foot of the breathtaking Mt. Olympus

There's a beautiful view of the city at night up here

My friends are awesome!
My hockey team is awesome! (pictures to come)

My brothers live nice and close.
Etc., etc., etc.

However, one thing stands in the way of absolute euphoria for this place, this people and otherwise my present circumstance...

Which is....
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Yes, I'm referring to my unfortunate position as a Cougar fan in Ute territory.

Every time I grab my BYU hat, or pull on my Cougar blue sweatshirt I just know to prepare myself for reaction. Last week at hockey for instance I wore my sweatshirt and probably 3 people told me I "better be careful wearing those colors around here," and "we need to get you some red."

I'm lucky though because I do have a pretty good size support group of fellow Cougar fans like Paul, Jared, Erin, Jamen, Jeremy, Wade, Gary, Andrew, and Brian. So usually at least at a ward function I normally get one positive comment regarding my choice of attire.

Well, today at 4pm MST it all comes to a head when the Cougars take on the Utes. If the Cougars can pull out a 'W' I can walk just a little taller in church on Sunday and maybe even offer a few jabs to my Ute friends who think the U of U is the best thing to happen since fry sauce. But...if, heaven forbid, the U walks away the victors... I will NEVER hear the end of it. Never.

GO COUGARS!! My safety in a hostile environment is on the line! :)

Let's do this again...

p.s. For the record, my friends are actually pretty cool about it, every person I've met up here has been nothing but sweet to me, just an occasional joke and even less occasional mockery, but always with a smile on their face. My brother's roommate told me awhile ago that I really only need to worry about the drunk U fans :).