Well, I’ve almost made it through another week without hacking off any necessary limbs, being struck by lightning or succumbing to heat stroke. In truth, the week has gone by awfully fast, which is nice. I guess.
Maybe it’s not. After all, it’s a whole week of my life and it’s over. Gone. Can’t get it back. Why its passing quickly should be a good thing is not quite clear to me.
I’ll save the philosophical questions about the benefits of flying time for later, thanks.
I played trivia at a place called Poor Richard’s Pub on Monday night. It’s one of the only places I’ve ever heard of that actually has REAL cash prizes (instead of HOUSE cash), and I figured I could use the extra $75. As should be expected with an attitude like that, I ended up in dead last place and won nothing but a ticket for a consolation pitcher of beer.
Poor Richard’s then announed that they will no longer have trivia. No joke.
On Tuesday of this week, I took the day off and traveled to Spartanburg, SC, for the 2005 Southern Conference Media football rouser and breakfast. This is a gathering held each year before the start of the football season at which members of the media (that’s me, I guess) watch a highlight film from the previous season, hear a speech from someone high up in the Southern Conference, eat breakfast, and then have the opportunity to interview all the coaches in the league as well as two players from each team.
The breakfast started at 8:00, so I left my house at around 5:30 and drove like a maniac. Managed to make it to downtown Spartanburg at 5 minutes before 8. Then became hopelessly lost and ended up driving around in circles for close to an hour before finally finding the hotel where the gala was taking place. So I missed everything except the interviews (and my free shirt, of course). Did get there in time to cast my preseason ballot for conference standings, which was cool. Interviewed three or four coaches, and a like number of players, with my friend Paul Barkley. Paul founded the fan site for Georgia Southern University about a year after I started The Unofficial Furman Football Page, and we’ve been buddies and rivals since that time. He’s a good guy and we enjoy getting to see each other once a year at the rouser and once or twice during the season (when Furman and GSU play each other).
In the 10 years or so since we started our websites, we’ve somehow achieved a sort of respectability with the Southern Conference offices and the coaches of the various teams, so we’ve been kind of accepted as official unofficial media people, which is sorta cool.
The preseason media poll, by the way, picked Furman at #1 and GSU at #2 – which is also sorta cool.
After I got back to Atlanta Tuesday afternoon, I hit Harry’s Market for some groceries and flowers and went over to a friend’s place to make dinner for us (she picked the recipe, I acted the part of chef). I made a mushroom casserole and some peach cobbler, both of which turned out to be quite good. Will definitely be trying the casserole again.
On Wednesday, I left work a bit early and headed over to Alpharetta to strap on the roller blades. Skated about 6 miles without falling (did have one amazing pirouette while attempting a “T-stop”, but managed to keep my balance long enough to sit down on a nearby bench – which is what I was trying to stop for). I brought water with me this time around – a very good thing – and also wore my heart monitor. Interesting thing about that: during the skating itself, my heartrate hung right around 170-175. However, when I first get out of my car at this place, there’s a long gentle downhill slope….so I get to start out my skate by zooming down this thing at ungodly speed. It takes absolutely no effort, but my heartrate immediately after completing the zoom was 179.
Who says terror isn’t great exercise?
Went swimming after my skate and swam some laps and watched television until about 10:00.
Last night, I went to Willie McGee’s to try to reassert my trivia dominance. Wound up in third ($10 in house cash), despite starting out very slowly. A furious 4th-quarter comeback put me in the money – and if the team in first going into the last question had had any cahones at all (it’s a wagering question), I would have leapfrogged them and ended up in second. They bet 1 point on their answer. I bet 20. They got it wrong, I got it right. Final scores: 1st – 110, 2nd – 93, Me – 92. Final question: Who won the ESPY award as the NFL’s best player (Peyton Manning, Indianapolis). I took a wild guess to get it right.
And so we come to today. I need to start a final push to migrate one of my servers tonight (and tomorrow night and probably Sunday night), so I’m taking it easy this morning. Am really hoping to get this server out of the way this weekend, as it’s been a thorn in my side for several months.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, has been Tom’s week in review.