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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (April 10, 2017)
3A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, APRIL 10, 2017 GOAT YOGA CRAZE Oregon yoga business goes viral Waitlist grew to 2,400 people Games help keep workers entertained By NATHAN BRUTTELL Corvallis Gazette-Times CORVALLIS — Jessie Ryan was ready to move out of her Warrior II pose when she felt a nudge on the back of her leg. When she turned around, she couldn’t help but laugh when she saw Quincy, a 1-year-old minigoat, staring back up at her. It was the moment Ryan had traveled from Portland to Oregon’s mid-valley to expe- rience: the birthplace of a nation-sweeping craze known as goat yoga. “How can you not connect with this face?” Ryan asked as Quincy bleated back to her. “You’re in the middle of doing a pose, thinking about how terrible everything is, when a goat comes up and kisses you or steps on your fingers and all that stress goes away. It sounds like something a modern-day Lewis Carroll would write.” Ryan joined 15 other peo- ple for one of the first goat yoga classes of the new year at Corvallis’ Hanson Country Inn. But they aren’t the only ones who have signed up for founder Lainey Morse’s ses- sions — the waitlist for the class grew to 2,400 people over the winter. Goat yoga combines a one- hour yoga session with the ani- mal-therapy of social mini- goats that wander around and interact with the class. When Albany’s Morse first combined the words “goat” and “yoga” for a simple event last July, she inadvertently created a media whirlwind. Since then, her life has been anything but simple. Goat yoga fever In the last eight months, stories have appeared in hun- dreds of media outlets around Pingpong, exercise room provide fun at Oregon Lottery By CLAIRE WITHYCOMBE Capital Bureau Andy Cripe/The Corvallis Gazette-Times While the rest of her classmates hold a yoga pose Jessie Ryan, of Portland, pauses to spend some time with Quincy the goat during Goat Yaga class in Corvallis. Andy Cripe/The Corvallis Gazette-Times Goats mingle during a Goat Yoga class. the world, including the Wash- ington Post, Time magazine, The New York Times, CNN, NPR, ESPN, National Geo- graphic, Vogue, BBC and hun- dreds of blogs. Last September, the Post’s Karin Brulliard wrote, “Well, it’s about time: Someone has finally launched a yoga class with goats” and noting that when Morse created the class “magic was made.” Two months later, under the headline “Bring a Yoga Mat and an Open Mind. Goats Are Provided,” New York Times reporter Kirk Johnson wrote, “As you smell that grass on a yoga mat, you realize that you have entered the goats’ world, not the other way around.” There is now a “Goat Yoga” page on Wikipedia, too. Even “Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon covered the story in a September opening monologue. “Apparently, there’s a farm in Oregon that offers a yoga class that you can take with goats roaming around you,” he said. “They even have a special position called the downward facing (soundbite of goat bleating).” Morse, who lives at Alba- ny’s No Regrets Farm with her 11 Nigerian dwarf goats, had hosted several goat-cen- tered events previously, including Goat Therapy (spending relaxing time with goats) and Goat Happy Hour (spending relaxing time with goats and wine). They were well-attended, locally pop- ular and helped supplement her income. But Morse had no idea goat yoga would hit like it did. “Nothing prepares you for that; it’s just absolutely mind-blowing” Morse said while preparing for a class at the Hanson Country Inn. “You always hear about something going viral but you don’t know what it means until you experience it. It’s intense. It’s like a roller coaster you can’t get off. It’s the most crazy thing you could ever do.” SALEM — The proof is in the pingpong: It really is fun and games at the Ore- gon Lottery. With the advent of smoke-free workplace laws, the lottery’s enclosed smok- ing area was not being used. Until a state employee gamely stepped up. “We had this space out there, so one of the employ- ees donated a pingpong table and people play,” said Chuck Baumann, a spokes- man for the Lottery. In the past, the employee engagement committee organized pingpong tourna- ments, but it’s not clear how much the table is used now, Baumann said Friday. The lottery’s former dep- uty director, Roland Ipar- raguirre, used to play, according to an investi- gation into his conduct reported by The Oregonian this week. Other diversions at the lottery office? A workout room that includes an ellip- tical machine, treadmill and set of weights, as well as video lottery games in demo mode. The Oregon Lot- tery chooses which games to buy among those offered by its three video lottery suppliers. Baumann said employ- ees use the amenities on their breaks. The pingpong table and other methods for staving off cubicle-induced ennui seem to be a selling point for the agency, which has more than 400 workers, according to a recruitment video on its website. In that video, the Ore- gon Lottery bills itself as a “billion-dollar a year enter- tainment company” that has all the trappings of a Sil- icon Valley startup: gen- erous benefits, a spirited workplace and a social ben- efit component (lottery pro- ceeds go to fish and wildlife conservation, education and veterans’ services, among other things). “Incidentally, because we are an entertainment company, sometimes we like to have a little bit of fun,” says the man in the promotional video. While the Oregon Lot- tery may not be the only state agency to have work- place diversions, it seems there’s no statewide inven- tory for such things. Items like pingpong tables are typically acquired informally through dona- tions. And they don’t require changes to existing state buildings, like mov- ing walls, according to state Department of Administra- tive Services spokesman Matt Shelby. The Capital Bureau is a collaboration between EO Media Group and Pamplin Media Group. 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