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We went to a football game today:
We were treated to a very nice sunset midway through the thing:
Prior to the game, we saw these guys again, the 2004 undefeated Auburn team. It was neat to see their recognition. They were a lot of fun to watch as players:
They’re all watching this package on the big screen:
Nothing like having your last event of the work week being a meeting, and then being stood up. I waited for half an hour, no word, and left.
I’d have rather had the meeting, and been done with it. Who knows when it will happen now. On the way home I had this view as a brief consolation:
But, hey, we got to talk about story ideas in class today — always a fun topic — and I still made it home in time to get an hour on my bike. I need more than one hour at a time, of course, but you take it where you can get it.
The Yankee and I set out together, but she said “See you at home,” which I took to mean, “Go have fun,” which really meant “Go hard.”
That was the plan, at least in two places. There were two courses I wanted to try to conquer today. One seemed easier than the other, but I had zeal for both of them. At least until my lungs gave out, which has a direct relationship to zeal. I was halfway up the long slow hill that marked the course I hoped to mark a new best time when everything seemed to give way. I pedaled harder, but it seemed I was going slower. I told my legs and lungs I wanted nothing to do with their protests, but they protested anyway.
And when I got home and checked the app I discovered that I had sliced 48 seconds off my best time on that course. That gave me the course lead over the next best time, by one whole second.
On the back half of my route today was the other course I wanted to master. And there it started to rain on me. Also, it was getting close to get dark. I ride on that particular stretch of road frequently, but this was only the second time I have timed myself on it. The course is designed for someone who can go all out for three straight miles. This isn’t my strength — I don’t really have a strength, I think — but we are all full of weaknesses and average talents of one sort or another. I dropped 1:38 off my last timed trip down the course and now I have the fast time on that segment, too.
On the last rode before the clouds came back again and I was rained on again. The twilight had turned to a full on flirt with the night. Two police cars passed me going the other direction and I expected one of them to turn around and give me some grief. But I pedaled furiously and made it home in the last embers of the day. The Yankee wasn’t very far behind me. I’d gone hard, and she did too.
Then we went out for Pie Day.
Another free commercial on the basis of a photo, a story and nostalgia. I should get a free meal for this, I think.
The sign, it seems, is getting a makeover. The old neon has been stripped out. And pulling the gas-holding-gas has just shown the smear of age and wear and rain and paint. I love that sign. There’s just something about that pig face, blissfully unaware what is happening to his real life counterparts inside, grinning stupidly despite the messages often on display on the marquee just below. Hopefully they aren’t replacing the whole thing.
The Yankee and I had our first meal there — Friday was Pie Day, I said, and she said yes. I used to eat there frequently when I was still broadcasting. It wasn’t far from the station. I’ve dined there with a lot of friends. I ate there with my book tonight. I’d swam a mile and a big baked potato sounded right.
It was just the thing after only a brunch. The editorial staff at the Crimson dined with the media relations folks late this morning. I took some leftovers to have fruit for lunch, but I’d swam a mile, you see, and I can look at a body of water and get hungry. Real and hearty food was what was required tonight, and there was no Italian to be had with friends. So I had a baked potato with a book.
Things to read … becausing reading always brings around friends. Just get comfy with something great, and someone will come along to interrupt.
Learning How to Score a Job Using Social Media, for Beginners is a free email-based class, if you’re interested.
A friend sent this. I hated telling him he’s going to have to find someone else to see it with. A 15,000ft descent, sheer drops and 300 deaths a year: Welcome to Bolivia’s Death Road, the terrifying route tourists love to cycle
Ukraine: Russian forces in major rebel cities:
A Ukrainian official said Tuesday that Russian forces have been spotted in both of the major rebel-held cities in eastern Ukraine.
The claim by Col. Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for Ukraine’s national security council, came as the country’s defense minister said Ukraine’s armed forces are expanding their strategy from just fighting separatist rebels to facing the Russian army in a war that could cost “tens of thousands” of lives.
Lost in America: Visa Program Struggles to Track Missing Foreign Students:
The Department of Homeland Security has lost track of more than 6,000 foreign nationals who entered the United States on student visas, overstayed their welcome, and essentially vanished — exploiting a security gap that was supposed to be fixed after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks.
“My greatest concern is that they could be doing anything,” said Peter Edge, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official who oversees investigations into visa violators. “Some of them could be here to do us harm.”
Yet another of the core competencies that DHS was created for … and it is less than a sterling success.
3 free iOS apps for visual storytelling:
(J)ournalists do not necessarily need a big budget, banks of editing software or even a desktop computer to create appealing visual stories.
These three apps for iPhone and iPad all allow you to create beautiful visual stories on the move without any special gear.
Even better, each are easy to use – and free.
When you said free, you had my attention. Shame that meal wasn’t also free.
Did I mention the rain? It rained at the tailgate. The hot summer day turned into an impressively humid one. And then the sun came back out and we baked ourselves in the shade.
We loaded up on sunblock, went into the stadium and watched most of the game before the lightning came. Lightning means delays. And so they took everyone off the field. They asked the fans to go hide. Most of them did. The storm cells with the lightning passed.
And just before the teams came back on the field to resume play, the rain finally came. The stadium speakers blared rain-themed music, the hearty students that stuck around sang along:
That raindrop at the end of the video is pure art, no? Purely accidental art.
We’d talked to a guy earlier who recalled when he was in the student body during the great monsoon of 2009. He said that game, the West Virginia game, was the best day of his life.
I recall getting rained on once or twice when I sat in the student body. I did not have the same recollection of good cheer. But the football wasn’t quite as good at that moment, either.
Anyway, this was before the storm, the cheerleaders wave those giant flags after scores. They are quite cumbersome, even on a still day:
And this is the storm as it wrapped around the northern end of the stadium. It was an impressive site:
Football is here. Friends are here. Triple-digit temperatures are … close. Triple-digit heat indexes … are close. We sat outside and in the sun and shade and it was 94 degrees. The company was good:
As we were walking up the ramps to the upper deck, we had a great view of fans coming in to the stadium:
We could also see the storm that delayed the game coming in:
Twitter’s new analytics tell me that almost 20,000 people saw that picture tonight. At least four different meteorologists retweeted it. But I didn’t get any lightning shots.
I did get a clear view of the rain shafts, though:
Auburn won 45-21. It was hot. The friends were lovely.
