I Won You!

Andrew's family took a little trip to Elmo, Utah over Spring Break. There is nothing of note about Elmo--about 350 people live there--they just went to say that they had been. Since they were down in that part of Utah and discovered there was little to do in Elmo, they visited the dinosaur museum in Price.

While walking around they had a discussion about Utah's state dinosaur, which apparently used to be the Allosaurus but is now the Utahraptor. Having just ended the discussion they stumbled upon the Utahraptor display, whereupon Jacob whispered to Emily,

"What's a Uta-ha Raptor?"

Utah, Jacob, Utah. Not Uta-ha.

He's lived here, in Utah, his whole life, which only adds to the hilarity.

Of course, I wouldn't doubt that, having been a Utah resident for almost seventeen years, he's picked up on the phrase "I won you!" to express a triumph, where others might say, "I beat you!"

That phrase has always bothered me. I first encountered it while playing games with a group of friends shortly after moving here. Since I was the only non-native Utahan in the room, I was severely outnumbered. I don't remember much about the game, except that I didn't win.

Whoever it was that won declared, "I won you!"

"Don't you mean, 'I beat you?'" I asked naively.

Everyone in the room was quite sure that the correct phraseology was in fact, "I won you!"

I have yet to be swayed, but I do like to use the phrase periodically in derision. Such was the case tonight. We were playing Triominoes. We like that game.

I had just won three games in a row and, contrary to Utah-belief, I didn't win Andrew at all. I won the game. I beat Andrew. I beat him over and over and over again. He was feeling a little sad so decided to challenge me to a "winner takes all" match, which I promptly declined. That would be like putting all my bragging rights on the line.

"What are you?" he asked, "Chicken? Come on, double or nothing!"

"That doesn't even make sense," I said calmly, "We're not gambling."

"Chicken!" he accused.

"Fine," I said, "If you get up and dance around the room like a chicken, I will think about it. If your dance is good enough, I'll play."

Apparently he really wanted to play another round because he stood up so fast that he chair fell over. His first attempt at a chicken dance was a little pathetic, due in part to the shock of knocking his chair over. I told him it was a no go. He got much more enthusiastic after that, flapping his arms just so and bawking at just the right time.

He was busy strutting around, bobbing his head, and pretending to peck at invisible feed when I finally gave in to his request under the condition that even if he won this round I would maintain my bragging rights.

And wouldn't you know it--I lost! But I'm perfectly fine with that because the truth is that I beat him fair and square in 3 of 3 games and he danced around the kitchen like a chicken for a good five minutes. He may have beaten me, but I certainly won him!