Eugene + the SLUG Queen: There’s no place like ‘gnome’

We’ve got some breaking ooze …

Not only does Eugene still have a SLUG Queen Competition and Coronation 42 years after the first one was held in 1983, it has a new SLUG Queen.

Her name is Queen Hilaria Gastrognome, but her slimy friends call her “Lari,” (pronounced Larry), and they formed a formidable cheer section Friday night, Aug. 8, at the Park Blocks at East Eighth Avenue and Oak Street. The judges couldn’t help but hear that section every time she took the stage.

Others around town might know the new queen as Jen McElroy, 47, who goes by Jen Jay when she’s doing stand-up comedy on open mic nights around town.

“I’ll leave you with this,” the ebullient McElroy said during the talent portion of the 43^rd annual SLUG Queen competition. “Ooze the change you want to see in the world, and take gnome mercy!”

And with that, the more than 200 folks who attended threw up a big cheer.

“She had a lot of heart,” said Brian Bull, the longtime KLCC reporter who served as one of three judges this year. “She had a lot of explosive personality. She had a really good way of interacting with the crowd in a way that wasn’t cloying or anything, it was just a very genuine love for community.”

McElroy bested five other candidates, including first and second runners-up Luke N. GOO’d (Sarah Majercin) and Marcel Slugcasso (Peter Almeida), to take the title.

Some things are so Eugene — Saturday Market, tie-dye, the Duck, Kesey Square, Pre’s Trail, Pre’s Rock, Pre anything — they’re embedded in the fabric and soul of the community and seem like they’ve always been here.

Include the annual crowning of the Society for the Legitimization of the Ubiquitous Gastropod’s, or SLUG, queen among them.

“Eugene has a history of quirkiness, of being idiosyncratic,” said Daniel Borson, a senior research assistant at the University of Oregon better known in SLUG circles as Queen Professor Bulbous Slimebledore, one of the “old queens” who was crowned in 2014, when asked why this eccentric tradition endures.

“In our cultural history, we have Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters and hippie culture, which Eugene is well-known for,” Borson said. “But even though a lot of that is dated now, each generation has its own quirkiness, its own idiosyncrasies, and one of the things I’ve seen over the years now, of attending these for over 20 years, is to see every new generation of quirkiness. And that needs to be nurtured. It needs to be fostered. It needs to be encouraged in every generation.

“And it’s just plain fun.”

Kim Still, who’s worn the title of First Lady in Waiting for the society for many years now, agreed.

“That’s really the only reason, it’s fun,” Still said. “You get to dress up, you get to laugh at people’s weird Eugene jokes.”

Jokes like the one McElroy told during the talent portion of the competition.

“I know I’m in Eugene, because I booked a Lyft the other day and the driver offered me a kombucha and a reading.”

Cue rimshot.

“It’s spontaneous and celebratory and silly and fun,” said Queen Markalo Parkalo, aka Mark Roberts, who was crowned in 2015 and received his 10-year anniversary pin Friday. “And we need lots of fun and silliness, I think.” 

Indeed, but SLUG queens also have a history of giving back to the community.

They’ve been connecting with local nonprofits since at least the late ‘90s, to promote community spirit and bring attention to needs that are dear to their hearts.

They’ve given their time and energy to organizations like the Hope and Safety Alliance (formerly Womenspace), FOOD for Lane County, the Greenhill Humane Society, the Lane Arts Council, Parenting Now (formerly Birth to Three) and the Willamette Animal Guild (WAG). 

They’ve opened art shows, marched in parades, made appearances at fundraising events, opened city parks, planted trees, helped with food drives and read stories to children at libraries and schools.

McElroy, who has a background as a chef and restaurant manager and once worked aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach, California, before moving to Eugene just over 20 years ago, plans to spend her one-year “rain,” as the old queens call it, supporting “a lot of social justice causes.”

One of her favorite nonprofits is Community Outreach through Radical Empowerment, or CORE, which serves unhoused youth ages 16 to 24.

“That’s a community that falls through a lot of cracks,” McElroy said, “and everything they do touches my heart.”