It was a bit too much for Sheriff Bill Tremaine and his deputies. Interviewed in the wee hours of dawn, New Years Day, Tremaine summed things up this way. "I was over at the Elks, eating spare ribs with the family, when Deputy Norm (Norman Fuchs) radioed me that someone was riding a horse in and out of the Sheridan with his hat on fire-- the guy on the horse's hat, not the horse, he wasn't wearing a hat. When Norm tried to make him stop, the flaming cowboy poured 200 proof rum on Norm and set him on fire. Then Norm radioed the Fire Department, but half of them were at a dance over at the Big Barn in Ridgway and the other half were what you'd call incommunicado."

"So, I went over to the Sherdian, along with Deputies Gorrell and Foozell, but there was a crowd of about, must a been three hundred, four hundred folks, and we couldn't get to the cowboy with the hat on fire to arrest him, so I went back to the Elks. When Foozell got back in her Sheriff's vehicle, she found someone had done a, well, a bad thing in the middle of the front seat. Then someone hiding in the alley next to Between the Covers fired a flare gun at Norm Fuchs which scared the hell out of him so he had to go to the Clinic to calm down. "

"About then, old Snopey Roper decided to drive his 1961 Land Rover down the Plunge after that crazy Jeff Price fellah bet him $75 he couldn't... So we had to cut Snopey out of what was left of his Rover, and arrest him for DUI and reckless driving and criminal endangerment, and then we charged Price with illegal wagering and aiding and abetting a vehicular felony. Then, after the two of them bonded out, they tried to drive Price's GMC up Black Bear Road after Snopey bet him double or nothing he couldn't make it over to Ouray, so we arrested 'em all over again..."

Meanwhile, on a more genteel note, a host of less frenzied festivities were held the length and breadth of Telluride, Mountain Village, Lawson Hill, Aldosoro Ranches, Down Valley, Norwood, and so on...Check out Tommi Knocker's column for all the gilded details on the best of 'em.