Northbound

This blog, August 17, 2007:

God damn it — I have to do better about stuff like this, and that means committing to exercise, even something so lame as walking on the blasted, motherless treadmill.  So.  My intention is to walk one hundred miles between now and the end of the year.  There are 136 days left in the year, so even at my pitiful, snail-like pace of one mile per day, I ought to be able to do this, even accounting for my near-complete sloth and more-than-complete revulsion about exercise.  So, counting yesterday, that’s one mile down, ninety-nine to go.

And, as of today, that’s one hundred miles down, no more miles to go (at least not this year).  Thanks to all of you who have read this far, and especially those of you who have commented with encouraging words.  Special thanks to Maximum Fitness in Flemington, New Jersey, Nike (makers of the Nike Shox, which would be the best shoe ever if they made it in a wide size), PrepSportswear (who make most of my T-shirts), Eddie Bauer (who make the rest), Apple (maker of the iPod Mini), National Review, and ESPN The Magazine.

And extra-special thanks to my wife, who heard a lot more whinging than you’ve read here, and never complained about it.

I’ll be back later with a What This All Means piece, and a note on the future of this blog, and my plans for the new year.  But for right now, I’m going to put my feet up and watch the Cowboys game.  Peace.

Ninety-nine miles down, one mile to go.

I walked three whole miles today, on the treadmill, after flying cross-country the day before, and a three-hour delay on top of that.  On my day off.  May not mean much to you, I don’t know.  I went to see the National Treasure sequel at the AMC at the big mall in Arlington the other day, and they had a trailer for some documentary about a marathon and the people who ran in it, and the tagline was something about how the marathon experience changed your life — how you woke up one person and went to bed another.  Don’t know about that, don’t want to know.  But nobody running a marathon ever worked harder than I have doing this hundred miles.  You have to do a marathon faster than what I walk, and you have to do it for a lot longer, but you don’t work any harder, and you sure-God don’t push yourself any more than what I do.  I believe that, if I don’t believe anything else.

Ninety-seven miles down, three miles to go.

Today’s post is brought to you by Continental Airlines, without which I would not have had two extra hours to kill in D/FW Airport, and would not have walked two miles through Terminal E.  Well done.

Ninety-four miles down, six miles to go.

Two points here.

First, if you are going to replicate this nonsense (why should you?), you need to get a car with heated leather seats.  I completely forgot that my Chrysler had this feature, and I’m kicking myself, because  heated leather seats are a Godsend for sore muscles if you have to drive in the car long distances.  So nice.

Second, I completely screwed up and misremembered when my gym was open; it’s open until 3 on New Year’s Eve but closed on New Year’s Day.  We leave tonight for Texas, and get back on Thursday the 27th.  So that means:

2 miles on Friday the 28th
2 miles on Saturday the 29th
2 miles on Sunday the 30th
2 miles on Monday the 31st

That adds up to eight miles, and I’ve done ninety-two miles so far, which means that…

Well, it means nothing, because there could be a freak snowstorm that buries Central Jersey during this stretch, making it impossible for me to do the mileage.  But it sets up nicely, or so you’d think.

Ninety-two miles down, eight miles to go.  A Merry Christmas to all and may God bless us, every one.

Than dead BearMeat.

Several weeks ago, sadly, Red Andrews announced his retirement over at BearMeat, Waco’s goofiest sports blog. Since he had two collaborators, we fans thought that the blog would continue, but now it seems positively, permanently dead.

Yep.  (And I’m not just a fan, I’m a contributor.  I mean, not where I’d be considered an unindicted co-conspirator or anything.)  All good blogs must come to an end, of course, but it still stinks.

Raise high that Rebel Yell, and may the streets of fair Sironia echo once again with the peals of drunken nonsense from high atop the Alico.

If I had anything clever or cute to say, I’d say it. Writing about being exhausted and sore is more exhausting than actually walking. And I have to do it all again tomorrow, and — because I’ll never catch up any other way — over the Christmas holiday, too. Bah humbug.

Eighty-nine miles down, eleven miles to go.

A mile and a third today, and then I got disgusted and had to stop.  Not depressed, not unhappy, nothing like that, just looked at myself and looked at the treadmill, and said, “That’s enough for today.”  There’s only so much you can do, and a man’s got to know his limitations.

Getting off early tomorrow, don’t you know, and should be able to knock out a couple of miles.  Then I have to get up early (i.e., before noon) on Saturday (God help me) and knock out a few more.  Then flying out to Texas on Saturday evening, probably not walking then — but coming back Thursday afternoon, and I can walk on Friday and Saturday, probably on Sunday, too.  Next Sunday is effectively the last day I can walk, as my gym is closed on New Year’s Eve.

Eighty-seven miles down, thirteen miles to go.

I commend to you this site, which uses Google Maps to show where college teams have played past road games, but venture on to it with trepidation, oh ye Baylor fan:

Baylor Road Games

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·9/12/98 Oregon State (L 17-27)
·9/26/98 Colorado (L 16-18)
·10/3/98 Texas Tech (L 29-31)
·10/24/98 Texas (L 20-30)
·10/31/98 Notre Dame (L 3-27)
·11/21/98 Oklahoma State (L 10-24)

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·9/4/99 Boston College (L 29-30)
·9/18/99 Oklahoma (L 10-41)
·10/9/99 Texas A M (L 13-45)
·10/30/99 Kansas State (L 7-48)
·11/6/99 Kansas (L 10-45)

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·8/31/00 North Texas (W 20-7)
·10/7/00 Texas Tech (L 0-28)
·10/21/00 Nebraska (L 0-59)
·10/28/00 Texas (L 14-48)
·11/18/00 Oklahoma State (L 22-50)

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·9/29/01 Iowa State (L 0-41)
·10/6/01 Texas A M (L 10-16)
·10/20/01 Oklahoma (L 17-33)
·11/10/01 Missouri (L 24-41)

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·8/31/02 California (L 22-70)
·9/14/02 New Mexico (L 0-23)
·10/19/02 Colorado (L 0-34)
·11/2/02 Texas Tech (L 11-62)
·11/9/02 Texas (L 0-41)
·11/23/02 Oklahoma State (L 28-63)

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·9/6/03 North Texas (L 14-52)
·10/11/03 Texas A M (L 10-73)
·10/18/03 Kansas (L 21-28)
·11/1/03 Kansas State (L 10-38)
·11/15/03 Oklahoma (L 3-41)

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·9/4/04 UAB (L 14-56)
·10/2/04 Texas (L 14-44)
·10/16/04 Nebraska (L 27-59)
·11/6/04 Texas Tech (L 17-42)
·11/13/04 Oklahoma State (L 21-49)

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·9/3/05 SMU (W 28-23)
·9/17/05 Army (W 20-10)
·10/1/05 Texas A M (L 13-16)
·10/8/05 Iowa State (W 23-13)
·10/22/05 Oklahoma (L 30-37)
·11/12/05 Missouri (L 16-31)

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·10/7/06 Colorado (W 34-31)
·10/14/06 Texas (L 31-63)
·11/4/06 Texas Tech (L 21-55)
·11/11/06 Oklahoma State (L 24-66)

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·9/1/07 TCU (L 0-27)
·9/22/07 Buffalo (W 34-21)
·9/29/07 Texas A M (L 10-34)
·10/13/07 Kansas (L 10-58)
·10/27/07 Kansas State (L 13-51)
·11/10/07 Oklahoma (L 21-52)

I mean, do you have to remind us of some of these games?  The ’98 loss to Notre Dame?  The ’99 loss to Boston College?  (That was a missed extra point in overtime, which fades into memory only because it was followed by the Kevin Steele Knee Game against UNLV.)  The Cal game in ’02?  The UAB game, for God’s sake?  Just because it’s cool to put the games on Google Maps doesn’t give whoever-this-is the right to torture poor Baylor fans this way.

Eighty-six miles down, fourteen miles to go.